Afflictions are oft mercies in disguise. We know not what we might have been without them. When God in His mysterious providence overthrows all our cherished plans, and we may receive sorrow in the place of joy, we will bow in submission and say, “Thy will, O God, be done.”....

We have learned in the midst of dark providences that it was not wise to have a will or way of our own, and to cast not reflection and surmises on the divine faithfulness. I feel that we are those who can understand and sympathize with each other. We are bound together by the grace of Jesus Christ and in the bonds of Christian sympathies made sacred by afflictions....

Afflictions are oft mercies in disguise. We know not what we might have been without them. When God in His mysterious providence overthrows all our cherished plans, and we may receive sorrow in the place of joy, we will bow in submission and say, “Thy will, O God, be done.” We must and we will ever cherish a calm, religious trust in One who loves us, who gave His life for us. “The Lord will command his lovingkindness in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me, and my prayer unto the God of my life. I will say unto God my rock, Why hast thou forgotten me? why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy?” ...

The Lord looks upon our afflictions. He graciously and discriminately metes them out and apportions them. As a refiner of silver He watches us every moment until the purification is complete. The furnace is to purify and refine, not to destroy and consume. He will cause those who put their trust in Him to sing of mercies in the midst of judgments. He is ever watching to impart, when most needed, new and fresh blessings, strength in the hour of weakness, succor in the hour of danger, friends in the hour of loneliness, sympathy, human and divine, in the hour of sorrow.

We are homeward bound. He that loveth us so much as to die for us hath builded for us a city. The New Jerusalem is our place of rest. There will be no sadness in the City of God. No wail of sadness. No dirge of crushed hopes and buried affection shall ever more be heard.—Daughters of God, 223, 224. BLJ 338


Men deficient in school education, lowly in social position, have, through the grace of Christ, sometimes been wonderfully successful in winning souls for Him. The secret of their success was their confidence in God. They learned daily of Him who is wonderful in counsel and mighty in power. MH 150



Why are you cast down, O my soul? And why are you disquieted within me? Hope in God; for I shall yet praise Him, the help of my countenance and my God. Psalm 42:11, NKJV