The Effect of Sin's Expulsion

“When she was come to her house, she found the devil gone out, and her daughter laid upon the bed.” — Mark vii. 30.

The immediate effect of cure is not a sense of exhilaration. This is true even of physical illness; the patient is most apt to feel his weakness in the hours of convalescence. But it is supremely true in the spiritual world. This maiden had been what we should now call regenerated; an evil spirit had been cast out of her. Yet the immediate effect is not encouraging. Instead of being elevated she is prostrated; she is found lying on a bed. She had lost her old energy. That energy had come from delusive desires; but it had probably made her charming. She had found that she had been chasing a shadow; but, during the chase, she had been brilliant. To find that it had been a shadow was gain; but it was gain that involved loss — not permanently indeed, but for to-day and to-morrow. It took away the zest from life; it dimmed for a time the sparkle of the eye; it substituted the heavy step for the wings of an eagle. A disillusioned soul is like a weaned The Effect of Sin’s Expulsion

child. When a young man first abandons the wine-cup he probably for a time abandons somet .;ng more. He may lose his sparkle, his humour, h”s brilliancy. He may lack the genial jest, the rady repartee, the mirth that made others merry. His comrades may miss in him the laugh that brought light and the charm that gave cheer and the buoyancy that for a night banished care. He has had to pay for his freedom, and it is no wonder if for an hour he is impoverished. It is a dreary season between Egypt and Canaan. It is well called a desert. Our treasures are often wrapped up in our trespasses so that to part with the latter is to part with the former. The resurrection from sin reveals at first but an empty tomb where the spices of life are useless and there is nothing worthy to be embalmed.

And yet, my Father, such is not the rest Thou hast in store for me. Thou hast not lifted me out of the passions of sin that I may enter into a life of passionlessness. I may be exhausted for a day, I may be prostrated for a night upon my bed. Yet my goal is not a couch, but a crown. There is coming to me a new passion, a fresh energy, a second youth. Hast Thou not said that the joyous things of this world are but shadows of things to come? Yes, my Father, and therefore I shall get back the equivalents of all that I have lost. Beyond these forty days of the wilderness there glimmers the light of a second Cana where the water once more shall be turned into wine. Thy latest word to every soul is this: “Arise, take up thy bed and walk!” Mine will be again the sense of morning, the glad look-out, the prospect of a promised land. Mine will be again the impulse of the young, the heat of expectancy, the blood made rapid by hope. Mine will be again the disbelief in limitations, the confidence in destiny, the faith that mountains will be removed. Mine will be again the poet’s dream — the belief that somewhere there is a city paved with gold. Mine will be again the communion of brotherhood — joined by the cup that quickens yet inebriates not, that dwarfs the care without making oblivious of the joy. Mine will be again the forgetfulness of earth’s decay — the trust that love will last, the hope that charity will be changeless, the sense that pity will be permanent, the faith that affection will abide, the instinct that sacrifice will survive, the assurance that between man and man devotion will not die. The fruits of Thy new world will give back the vintage of the old; he who begins upon the bed will culminate on the wing.