SUNDAY READING.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1197, 8 February 1895, Page 14

SUNDAY READING.

LOVE CROWNING SORROW.

BY BEY WILLIAM BIBCH, D.D. For the Spirit himself maketh intercession for [godliness in us] with groaniugs which cannot be uttered. Bomans | viii., 26. Everyone that loveth is born of God. I I. John iv., 7. The centre of love is not in oneself, but in others. In its finest meaning, love is not self - gratification through being in possession of or communion with another, but joy arising from the unselfish wish to servo another and the bliss of being able to do it. In marriage, true love does not obtain another for oneself, but gives oneself for the earthly happiness of the other. Compassion and friendship are noble but temporary impulses which depend on feelings—we pity the poor, the suffering, and go to dinner as usual; we are friendly to approved ones, and when not approved, turn from them with dislike—but lovo is an eternal force, a part of oneself, and goes with us into the other world. We are so identified with others as to become bone of their bone and flesh of their flesh; like God, we ard transformed into Love, whose unselfish kindness to troubled souls is like the warm sunbeam in tho cold twilight of early morn.

I. Love Brings Sorrow. Byron said, " Love made his best interpreter a sigh.” A healthy horse when kindly treated is in a perfect world, and enjoys continual peace, for though he lores those who care for him, yet, not knowing their troubles, be has no sorrow on their account. But this is not a perfect world to us—we know. We are influenced by the conduct of those we love as the barometer by the atmosphere, and their failure, sickness, or death, makes a background of sorrow to our joy in loving them. How painful when we cannot keep them from doing wrong, and how keen our distress when we cannot help them except by words in their time of sore need. “ Love reflects the thing beloved.” Love inspired Jacob to serve Laban seven years for Bachael ; “ and they seemed unto him but a few days, for the love he had to her.” Love inspired David to cry, “O, my son Absalom! would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son !” And if they have caused us to grieve, those who love us are grieved on that account. After Peter’s denial, love broke him down into bitter tears because he had grieved the gentle Christ. And, suiely, when the forgiven prodigal saw his father’s hair white as snow, was he not bowed down with grief ? But even with the accompanying sorrow, love is the delightful sunshine of the heart. Though afterwards parted by distance or death, to have found and loved our mate makes life worth living; and in a higher ; ?sense, to be deeply and unselfishly interested in some of our fel-low-creatures is life.” Congreve said, “ ’Tis better to be left, than never to have been;.doyedi”- The joy, however, is not in being., lbVbd, but in loving. Tennyson breathes ;this thought in the wellknown lines, “ ’Tis better to have loved and lost, Than never to have loved at all.” When her child suffers racking pain, does the anxious mother wish her love were less ? When the young wife sees her brave and gentle husband breathing 1 his last, does she wish the love that breaks her heart might be unfelt ? Ah, no ; there is ineffable joy in the tender unselfish service it inspires. The bigger the heart the greater the sorrow ; and, judging from our standpoint, the most sorrowful is God. Having become bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh, he is affected by the conduct of His human children as the father by that of his prodigal son. The " music and dancing” in the heart of our heavenly Father is put av ay until His children come home. Pity constrains us to give words and things, and friendship bestows kindly communion, but love gives oneself. Plato said, " Dove will make men die for their beloved —love alone; and women as well as men.” lit' the over-crowded life-boat, love gives its place to the other one—every fellowcreature is the "other one." It is the crown, of : love to suffer for the beloved, the Arising from the knowledge that our service comforts or saves them.

So our invisible Father gave Christ, through whom He eternally revealed Himself, to put off His glory and become a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief. Yet Christ had ineffable joy, because His sacrifice was to save every man, and in His enslavement for mankind and His death on the cross Ho shone with more glory than when He reigned for our Father on the Throne. 11. Love is Creation’s Goal. Love created and evolved us; love redeemed us, and to transform every penitent soul into a fac-simile of Christ is the purpose of God. The tribulation, misery and hell which result from wickedness and the heartbreakings caused by wilful sin which, because it is sin, He cannot give us grace to bear, are felt by our Father as an iron touching the apple of the eye; and therefore in every soul He beseeches with groanings which cannot be uttered for the birth of penitence and the life of godliness, for He cannot release us from suffering until we love our fellowcreatures as He loves us all. As the father gives his sons to the war and to suffer on the field of death for the good of the nation, and as the mother gives her child to the dentist for his personal good, and groans in his groan, so God gave his beloved Son, Jesus, and us, His other children, to suffer one for another, each for all. God has taken us all into His heart, and made us one family, one body, and as we learn this sublime truth we shall be inspired to love others as oneself. To fence ourselves off from our fellow-creatures with Society or Cfiureli

partitions, as if we were a different breed, and had a different Father from the outsiders, is opposed to the .welfare of mankind. All ranks and conditions are as the crumbs of one loaf, and Hod means us to be inspired with the unselfish love of a family whose joy is to minister to one another —it is, as Tennyson says, the “ one far off divine event to which the whole creation moves.” Knowing this truth, let us cultivate gentleness, forbearance, forgiveness and unselfish activity in the service of others. Though we may dislike the ways of our fellow-creatures, let us not turn from any, but be ever ready to give a helping hand to a man, woman or child in need. In home life, let us grow the plant of graciousness in our manners and words, and strive through the divine groaning within us to bo the embodiment of sweetness and light. “ Could we forbear disputes, and practise love, Wo should agree as angels do above.”

A man who despairs of himself, aslcs, “ Does God love me ?” ' Yes, He loves you as you are. Though you may be wicked, He loves you as the father loved his prodigal son. You ask, “ Why does God love me ?” Because it is He ; because it is you ; because He is Loye ! In dealing with a follow-man we "must love him ere to us he will seem worthy of our love.” So I say to every fallen one, to the “ cast-away ” saint, arise pnd live, for the love of God makes you worthy of His love and worthy of the love of your brother-men. God loves you and also me; let us therefore bo godly to one another !