Can it indeed be that
God, if He be all-embracing, all-loving, all-powerful, can create
or allow to arise within Himself something that is not, Himself,
alien to Him, hostile to Him? How can we believe in Him and trust
Him, if this indeed be so?
And yet, looking upon that little flock to-day, I did indeed feel
the presence of a kind and fatherly heart, of something that
grieved for my pain, and that laid a hand upon my shoulder, saying,
"Son, endure for a little; be not so disquieted!"
March 8, 1891.
Something--far-off, faint, joyful--cried out suddenly in the depths
of my spirit to-day. I felt--I can but express it by images, for it
was too intangible for direct utterance--as a woman feels when her
child's life quickens within her; as a traveller's heart leaps up
when, lost among interminable hills, he is hailed by a friendly
voice; as the river-water, thrust up into creeks and estuaries by
the incoming tide, is suddenly freed by the ebb from that stealthy
pressure, and flows gladly downwards; as the dark garden-ground may
feel when the frozen soil melts under warm winds of spring, and the
flower-roots begin to swell and shoot.
Some such thrill it was that moved in the silence of the soul,
showing that the darkness was alive.
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