EVERY SATURDAY RELIGIOUS LIFE

Southland Times, Issue 23438, 19 February 1938, Page 21

EVERY SATURDAY RELIGIOUS LIFE

(By

POPOKOTEA)

FULL-TONED SYMPATHY

Bad blood is made when people come to feel that others care very little for their welfare. Nothing is worse for the world than the spirit which makes people act as if they were thinking:—“l am I, and you are /S/ - . a . n that’s an end of it.” When the apostle Paul addressed a letter to the Christian congregation in Rome he bade them “rejoice with them that do rejoice, an weep with them that weep.” For do we not find that life is a blending o sunshine and shadow Clouds gather over one life. Sunshine streams into another. A full-toned sympathy will rejoice as well as weep. Actually, it is easier to do one of these than both. Some people have a gift of sympathizing wherever trouble is found. Sorrow in another calls ou their generous aid. But they may not always be so responsive to■happiness in others. They “weep with them that weep,” and go no further, /hen there are hearty souls who readily rejoice with their companions but hold alo ° from trouble. An all round development is not easily attained. Most men are lopsided. They lean to one or the other of these two sides of sympathy. Probably most people find it easier to show sympathy in trouble than to rejoice with happy folk. The current usage of the word sympathy sug gests a fellow-feeling with the sad or the wounded who have come down in the world. Sympathy with pain or loss is the most obvious expression for ordinary people. Indeed it does appear to be more of a Christian duty o sympathize with people in their handicaps and losses than to rejoice with the successful. A full-toned sympathy, however,. rejoices, with the robus in health just as much as it feels pity for the victims of vice. Sympathy laug s as well as cries. It sings as much as it sobs. If a man loses a child we assure' him of our sympathy. But if he inherits a fortune we do not so readily rejoice with him. Full-toned sympathy goes out to princes as we as peasants. It identifies itself so coi<:letely with others, that, in their joy it is radiant, and in their grief deeply distressed. As we grow older it becomes easier to “rejoice with them that do rejoice, and weep with them that weep.” It was one of the Greek poets who sang. “Taught by time, my heart has learned to glow For others’ good, and melt at others’ woe.” Taught by time we may learn to master the two sides of sympathy. When one Evangelist in the N.T. describes the ministry of Jesus he noted the first house into which Jesus entered. It was a house clouded by anxiety. Peter s mother-in-law lay wracked by malarial fever. When Jesus entered that house he was sympathizing with a family in their distress. Anomer Evangelist in the N.T. describing the same ministry of Jesus noted that the first house He entered was full of happy guests and friends at a wedding. Jesus shared their delight. A high sensitivity to these two facets of human life is a distinct mark of enlightened personality.

THE BIBLICAL WINDOW

KEEPING FAITH 2 Tim: 4:7: “I have kept the faith.” Each life finds God by being true to the highest it sees in its own chosen field: and there in the place of supreme fidelity its power is hidden. The lawyer must keep faith with God in his passion for justice. The doctor should have a sense of fellowship with God in his regard for the sacredness of human life. The merchant should keep faith with God in the honest quality of the goods he offers. The engineer should keep faith with the moral order by building that which will stand in the day of testing. The artist keeps faith with God by spreading his colours on canvas in such a way as to make his lines true and his picture a thing of beauty. —Dean C. R. Brown. NOBLE VIRTUES: GENTLENESS By gentleness we do not mean weakness, but a certain, quality that brings a grace and charm into life. The greatest men will be found to be the gentlest. Gentleness is like the oak tree.. It will face the blast of centuries of storm, and then, in season, will gently break forth into leafage where the song of birds is heard. Lord Shaftes-

bury said that he felt more honoured by the little girl who asked him to guide her across a crowded London street “because he looked so kind,” than by the praise of the great. Gentleness, loving consideration for others, is one of the finest features of a noble character. This noble virtue was graciously present in the busy country doctor who stopped by the wayside and tenderly set the broken leg of a wounded partridge which could pay nd fee. It was present in the young nobleman who, stepping onto a ferry steamer on a bitterly cold day, took off his plaid and placed it over a poor, woman and her child who were crouched, shivering on the deck of the steamer. “Blessed are the gentle,” said the Great Teacher, “for they shall inherit the earth.” Gentleness is balm to hearts which have been wounded in life’s stern battle. FOUR WISE THINGS There be four things which are little upon the earth, but they are exceeding wise: The ants are a people not strong, yet they prepare their meat in the summer; The conies are but a feeble folk, yet make their houses in the rocks; ‘ The locusts have no king, yet go they forth all of them by bands; The spider taketh hold with her hands, and is in kings’ palaces. —Proverbs 30, 24.