But how about you? Have you had similar experiences?
Many of you probably will say: We know the hours of distress--we also know how deeply depressing they may be. Even though we may not have wept and lamented, like the first disciples, because of the scorn and ridicule by the world, we often have shed tears that betrayed the presence of a wounded heart. But we did not go farther in our understanding of the meaning of the sorrowful moments. We have felt their pressure, but we have lost sight of their blessedness; we have been unable to discover the gain which they mean to our lives.
Look to the depths of your own soul and then tell me: Do you not feel the hidden connection between the sin, as it had attained power in your soul, and the pressure of the brief, sorrow-laden moments? Have you not also in such moments felt a truer, a more sincere and deeper disgust with the evil character of sin, than otherwise? Did not that wish soar upward from the very bottom of your soul: Would I were relieved of all that is evil so that I might live with "all my thoughts pure, and all my deeds unblemished"?
But if you have felt this, then you already are somewhat conscious of the blessedness of the moments of distress, for that is what is asked of us first of all. Without disgust with the evil being of sin we cannot renounce the devil and all his works and all his ways.
But is that all to which the brief, sorrow-laden moments can guide and help us? No--the faith of the disciples was strengthened during the little while. It is true that their faith wavered in that while, and that it looked as though it would collapse, but _this was not the agony of death, but the pangs of birth_.
Hitherto they had been accustomed to seeing Jesus and then believing in Him. Now _that_ faith was to be born which would cling to him through His word without seeing Him. During the little while it looked as though Jesus had suffered defeat and the world had conquered. But after the resurrection the disciples saw the meaning of it all: Jesus had taken death upon Himself not because He was vanquished but because the Father, in His unfathomable wisdom and His eternal love, had thus decided it for the purpose of salvation.