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most comfortable, is so often, alas, most ungodly, at least among the
men. Less common, thank God, is this ungodliness among the women. The
nursing of the sick; the cares of a family, often too sorrows, manifold
and bitter, put them continually in mind of human weakness, and of their
own weakness likewise. Yes. It is sorrow, my friends, sorrow and
failure, which forces men to believe that there is One who heareth
prayer, forces them to lift up their eyes to One from whom cometh their
help. Before the terrible realities of danger, death, bereavement,
disappointment, shame, ruin--and most of all before deserved shame,
deserved ruin--all the arguments of the conceited sophist melt away like
the maxims of the comfortable worldling; and the man or woman who was but
too ready a day before to say, "Tush, God will never see, and will never
hear," begins to hope passionately that God does see, that God does hear.
In the hour of darkness; when there is no comfort in man nor help in man,
when he has no place to flee unto, and no man careth for his soul: then
the most awful, the most blessed of all questions is: But is there no one
higher than man to whom I can flee? No one higher than man who cares for
my soul and for the souls of those who are dearer to me than my own soul?
No friend? No helper? No deliverer? No counsellor? Even no judge? No
punisher? No God, even though He be a consuming fire? Am I and my
misery alone together in the universe? Is my misery without any meaning,
and I without hope? If there be no God: then all that is left for me is
despair and death. But if there be, then I can hope that there is a
meaning in my misery; that it comes to me not without cause, even though
that cause be my own fault. I can plead with God like poor Job of old,
even though in wild words like Job; and ask--What is the meaning of this
sorrow? What have I done? What should I do? "I will say unto God, Do
not condemn me; shew me wherefore thou contendest with me. Surely I
would speak unto the Almighty, and desire to reason with God."

"I would speak unto the Almighty, and desire to reason with God." Oh my
friends, a man, I believe, can gain courage and wisdom to say that, only
by the inspiration of the Spirit of God.

But when once he has said that from his heart, he begins to be justified
by faith. For he has had faith in God; he has trusted God enough to
speak to God who made him; and so he has put himself, so fa