(1) Free Through Suffering "Thou hast enlarged me when I was in distress"(Ps. 4:1). This is one of the grandest testimonies ever given by man to the moral government of God. It is not a man's thanksgiving that he has been setfree from suffering. It is a thanksgiving that he has been set free through suffering: "Thou hast enlarged me when I was in distress." He declares the sorrows of life to have been themselves the source of life's enlargement. And have not you and I a thousand times felt this to be true? It is written of Joseph inthe dungeon that "the iron entered into his soul." We all feel that what Joseph needed for his soul was just the iron. He had seen only the glitter of the gold. He had been rejoicing in youthful dreams; and dreaming hardens the heart. He who sheds tears over a romance will not be most apt to help reality; real sorrow will be too unpoetic for him. We need the iron to enlarge our nature. The gold is but a vision; the iron is an experience. The chain which unites me to humanity must be an iron chain. That touch of nature which makes the world akin isnot joy, but sorrow; gold is partial, but iron is universal. My soul, if thou wouldst be enlarged into human sympathy, thou must be narrowed into limits of human suffering. Joseph's dungeon is the road to Joseph's throne. Thou canst not lift the iron load of thy brother if the iron hath not entered into thee. It is thy limit that is thine enlargement. It is the shadows of thy life that are the real fulfillment ofthy dreams of glory. Murmur not at the shadows; they are better revelations than thy dreams. Say not that the shades of the prison-house have fettered thee; thy fetters are wings--wings of flight into the bosom of humanity. The door of thy prison-house is a doorinto the heart of the universe. God has enlarged thee by the binding of sorrow's chain.--George Matheson If Joseph had not been Egypt's prisoner, he had never been Egypt's governor. The iron chain about his feet ushered in the golden chain about his neck.--Selected
(2) Deeper "Not much earth" (Matt. 13:5). Shallow! It would seem from the teaching of this parable that we have something to do with the soil. The fruitful seed fell into "good andhonest hearts." I suppose the shallow people are the soil without much earth--those who have no real purpose, are moved by a tender appeal, agood sermon, a pathetic melody, and at first it looks as if they would amount to something;but not much earth--no depth, no deep, honestpurpose, no earnest desire to know duty in order to do it. Let us look after the soil of our hearts. When a Roman soldier was told by his guide that if he insisted on taking a certain journeyit would probably be fatal, he answered, "It is necessary for me to go; it is not necessaryfor me to live." This was depth. When we are convicted something like that we shall come to something.The shallow nature lives in its impulses, its impressions, its intuitions, its instincts,and very largely its surroundings. The profound character looks beyond all these, and moves steadily on, sailing past all storms and clouds into the clear sunshine which is always on the other side, and waiting for the afterwards which always brings the reversionof sorrow, seeming defeat and failure. When God has deepened us, then He can give us His deeper truths, His profoundest secrets,and His mightier trusts. Lord, lead me into the depths of Thy life and save me from a shallow experience! On to broader fields of holy vision; On to loftier heights of faith and love; Onward, upward, apprehending wholly, All for which He calls thee from above.--A. B. Simpson
(3) Perfection of Suffering "The Lord will perfect that which concerneth me"(Ps. 138:8). There is a Divine mystery in suffering, a strange and supernatural power in it, which has never been fathomed by the human reason. There never has been known great saintliness of soul which did not pass through great suffering. When thesuffering soul reaches a calm sweet carelessness, when it can inwardly smileat its own suffering, and does not even ask God to deliver it from suffering,then it has wrought its blessed ministry; then patience has its perfect work;then the crucifixion begins to weave itself into a crown. It is in this state of the perfection of suffering that the Holy Spirit works manymarvelous things in our souls. In such a condition, our whole being lies perfectly still under the hand of God; every faculty of the mind and will and heart are at last