Description
A Collection of Poems and Articles:
Teach Me to Love; Two Roses; Faithful Over a Few Things; Numbering Israel; Some Thoughts about Resentment; The Problem of the Hickory Tree; The Closed Hand; The Walk through the Corn Field; The Man Who Outlined; Dreams; Purification; Gideon’s Three Hundred; Steadying the Ark; Discouragement; Compassion; “Sermons in Stones.” Each article in this collection is a spiritual lesson with a gentle, sweet but scientific treatment that often rebukes without offending. Perhaps that is why these articles are as appealing today as when they were first written.
From the article, “Some Thoughts about Resentment,” comes this compassionate statement: “On his very cross Jesus prayed his Father to forgive those who were crucifying him, yet his own earthly career holds no record of a single mistake. Should we not remember this, we who have been dragging along with us through many weary years the memory of something unforgiven — and hence unforgotten? Once in the past there was a misinterpreted word, a misconstrued look, a misapprehended action, and the broken friendship, like Banquo’s ghost, has haunted our footsteps ever since, and ‘will not down.’ And yet a misunderstanding is a thing so tiny at best — just a little seed, springing, perhaps, just from a difference in a point of view! And yet, when watered by angry tears, it has been known to grow in a single night to such proportions that very good friends have lost each other — for a while — in its labyrinth of shade. Should not the one who is first to struggle out into the sunlight count it a joy and a privilege to turn back and seek the other, still groping in the darkness? He saw the light first because he loved the most, and the one who loves the most will always make the first advance. Surely we would all be more gentle in dealing with an erring brother could we know under what difficulties he is working, and how heavy are the burdens which for the moment make his progress slow. He will drop them after a while, but in the meantime, should we add to his load the weight of our condemnation?”