ly away
from us. Vain regret, absorbed brooding over what is gone, a sorrow kept
gaping long after it should have been healed, like a grave-mound off
which desperate love has pulled turf and flowers, in the vain attempt to
clasp the cold hand below--in a word, the trouble that does not withdraw
us from the present will never be a door of hope, but rather a grim gate
for despair to come in at.

The trouble which knits us to God gives us new hope. That bright form
which comes down the narrow valley is His messenger and herald--sent
before His face. All the light of hope is the reflection on our hearts
of the light of God. Her silver beams, which shed quietness over the
darkness of earth, come only from that great Sun. If our hope is to grow
out of our sorrow, it must be because our sorrow drives us to God. It is
only when we by faith stand in His grace, and live in the conscious
fellowship of peace with Him, that we rejoice in hope. If we would see
Hope drawing near to us, we must fix our eyes not on Jericho that lies
behind among its palm-trees, though it has memories of conquests, and
attractions of fertility and repose, nor on the corpse that lies below
that pile of stones, nor on the narrow way and the strong enemy in front
there; but higher up, on the blue sky that spreads peaceful above the
highest summits of the pass, and from the heavens we shall see the angel
coming to us. Sorrow forsakes its own nature, and leads in its own
opposite, when sorrow helps us to see God. It clears away the thick
trees, and lets the sunlight into the forest shades, and then in time
corn will grow. Hope is but the brightness that goes before God's face,
and if we would see it we must look at Him.

The trouble which we bear rightly with God's help, gives new hope. If we
have made our sorrow an occasion for learning, by living experience,
somewhat more of His exquisitely varied and ever ready power to aid and
bless, then it will teach us firmer confidence in these inexhaustible
resources which we have thus once more proved, 'Tribulation worketh
patience, and patience experience, and experience hope.' That is the
order. You cannot put patience and experience into a parenthesis, and
omitting them, bring hope out of tribulation. But if, in my sorrow, I
have been able to keep quiet because I have had hold of God's hand, and
if in that unstruggling submission I have found that from His hand I
have been upheld, and had strength above mine own