SHARING OUR TROUBLES

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 190, 28 August 1937, Page 14

SHARING OUR TROUBLES

"1 poured out my complaint before Him; I shewed before Hihi my trouble." — Pgalm 142/2. Here is a good man in trouble. To some folks tkat is rather 6urprising, for they ussume that a good man ought never to be in trouble, Hoes iiot God exist for the purpose of securiug such a man exemption from diatress? That is how some folks xeason, But they have no warrant for their argument. Our Lord's word is very delhiite — "Let uot yohf keurt be troublod." He did not say "let not your life be troubledA'# for He knew that nobody can pass throdgh such a world as this without striking trouble soiiiewhero. 11 e Himseif was iiot exempted, lielther are His followers. So wheu We afe iil trouble there is one thing we mhst never do: we muat never iinagine that we have a oase against God, a case which He haB to answer. Eather must we seek what He does promise— NOT exemption from trouble, but seeurity EN.it. There are some people who seem to taka pleasure in Airing their troubles wherever they go and before whomsoever will listen, But that is gefleraliy a slgn of spiritual sicknetss. Healthy souls shrink from exposing their trou» bles to the world and there is .some* thing very flne and encouragiug in their courage. At the same time, thero is grave idanger in ihe troubles that are never shovvn to anybody at all. Constant repression of them invariabiy sets up a tension within which often results in spiritual malady. It is quite right to, hide the pangs we feei from tne eyes of the world; but it is quite wrong to show them to nobody at all. And what a boon it is when in trouble to have someone to wlioip we can unloek our hearta and unburden our idoulsl yii.owtng our troubles to soiue such trustworthy oiid, sliowiug them before ihe right person, helps us to compose our minds bofoie lli'e^s frowniug face and kecp our feet in lil'e's slippery ways. One oi' the dangers of keeping our troubles entirely to ourselves and showing them "beloro nobody at all is that they assuliie a niaguitUde greater thatt they deserve and take on an intenaity t'ar beyond what they warrant, But when we place them in a larger area than our own persOnal life and set them out in relation to facts other than tho&e which form the content of our lives, our view of them changes and our attitude to them becomes difi'erent. An elephant placed in your garden appears a fearsome crcature and would cause you uo smail coinrtiotion of spirit, Set in a great purk ot hundrods of acres it would look dilferent and. have 1 (lifferent ell'ect upoii you, in that larger uruti, in relation (0 the distariviM it holds and against the backgrounrl ot tlie objects it cotiiains, the elephant would look difFerent attd your attitude 1.0 it would ilndergo a transformation. It Is tlie same with troubles. Looketl at in tlm nnrrOw space of my ovvu lii'e lliey are oue thing; in tlie larger area nf the fellowship called mto being by Ihe iatimscy of another TuL'e sirith uiy

own they are another thing. Viowecl solely in relation to the remaining facts df my Own life they assume Ouo appearance. Yiewed in relation to the facts of the larger life about me they look quite difFerent. Troubles are transformed by the b&okgroufld against which you place thc-m, by tho person or object you show them before. What a transformation they umlergo when we shaw them before God, When we go further and show Our troubles before the God-and Fathef of our Lord Jesus Christ, we find that We are showing them before a Cross of black darkness and inscrutable sufi'ering, before an agoiiy which in its cry oi' dereliction toi'e its quivering way right into the heart of God,. before a ti'ouble which broke the heart of the Saviour of the World. There our troubles look vastly, difi'erent, our attitude to thein undergoei radical chaiigc, our will to bear them is transformed and our hope of conquest revived out of doubt into assurance,