ter what burdens they may throw upon us. We will be happy anyway,
because God has willed that we should be happy. If we see things going
wrong we should take the burden to the Lord, saying: "Lord, thou must bear
the responsibility of these things. My shoulders were not made to bear
these burdens. They are thine. I give them over to thee. If anything is to
be accomplished, thou must do it." Then we must take our hands off. We
must let the thing go, treat it as something that is none of our business,
and let God handle the situation.

Again, he said, "Neither be thou envious against them that work
unrighteousness." It is so easy to look upon those who are rich and who
are not using their money for God, and think, "I wish I had their money;
how much good I might do with it!" Or perhaps when we see talented people
of the world, we might say, "Oh, if I had the ability they have, I would
use it for the Lord!" God does not want us to do this; that is, to envy
them their riches or their talents. It is all right for us to wish that we
had more money or greater talents to use for the Lord, but it is not right
to be envious of others. Even wishing that we had more is a waste of time.
The thing that is important is that we use what we do have.

If we are given to letting ourselves worry and fret over things that
others do toward us, it is often an incentive to them to try to make us
trouble. We see a good illustration of this in the life of Hannah. Elkanah
had two wives. Peninnah had a number of children, but Hannah was
childless. Peninnah took advantage of this to reproach Hannah, and it is
said she "provoked her sore, to make her fret" (1 Sam. 1: 6). There are
some people who delight in twitting others about some fault or physical
defect, or because of lack of ability or something of that sort. If they
see that this causes us to fret, it only increases their desire to provoke
us. Then again, some people like to make sport of others, and tease them;
and if they see that some one can not hear it well, if it frets him and
worries him, this only increases their delight. I have heard such people
say, "I just like to tease So-and-so; he can not stand it at all." Saints,
of course, should never do such a thing as that; they should have more
regard for the feelings of others. But sinners will do such things. We may
expect it. Therefore, the thing to do is to learn not to fret over it, but
to submit our ways to God and bear it patiently.