Pitying Love Like as a father
pitieth his children, so the Lord pities them that fear him. Psalm 103, verse 13 Abba, Father, is a Gospel word,
a father bending over the sick bed of his weak or dying child,
a mother pressing in tender solitude and infant sufferer to her bosom. These are the earthly pictures
of God. As a father pities, as one whom
his mother comforts, so will I comfort you. When tempted in
our season of overwhelming sorrow to say, Never has there been
so dark a cloud, never a heart so stripped and desolate as mine,
Let this thought hush every murmur. It is your father's good pleasure. The love and pity of the most
tender parent is but a dim shadow compared to the pitying love
of God. If your Heavenly Father's smile
has, for a moment, been exchanged for the chastening rod, be assured
there is some deep necessity for the altered discipline. If
there be unutterable yearnings in the soul of the earthly parent
as the lancet is applied to the body of his child, infinitely
more is it so with your Covenant God as He subjects you to those
deep wounds of heart. Finite wisdom has no place in
His ordinations. An earthly father may err, is
ever-erring, but, as for God, His way is perfect. This is the
explanation of His errory dealing. Your Heavenly Father knows you
have need of all these things. Trust his heart when you cannot
trace his ways. Do not try to penetrate the cloud
which he brings over the earth, and to look through it. Keep
your eye steadily fixed on the rainbow. The mystery is God's. The promise is yours. Seek that
the end of all his dispensations may be to make you more confiding. Without one misgiving, commit
your way to Him. He says regarding each child
of His covenant family what He said of Ephraim of old, and never
more so than in a season of suffering. I do earnestly remember Him still. While now, bending your head
like a bulrush, your heart breaking with sorrow, remember His pitying
eye is upon you. Be it yours, even through blinding
tears, to say, Even so, Father.