A little boy sat in a wheel chair. The hand of Fate had already rested
heavily upon his tender years. A paralysis had laid hold upon him and had
left him as helpless as an infant. His drawn lips could not speak. His
eyes could not keep themselves focussed upon any object. Only one thing
about him remained normal. His mind continued to function. He knew, felt,
joyed, desired, and suffered.
In some unfeeling, intellectually ideal republic, such a pitiful piece of
human wreckage might have been cast upon the junk heap. It was so done in
the old day, and so it would be done again if a certain type of statesman
might have his pitiless way. Utopias too seldom make proper allowance for
such poor unfortunates. They cannot produce anything. They are necessarily
a care and a burden to others. They are worth nothing in money to society.
They are not social assets. They are social liabilities.
Fortunately, this child did not dwell in a state which reckoned things on
such a basis. He was born a citizen of the blessed kingdom of love. The
disposition of his poor, stricken life was not determined by the dictates
of the head. It was decided by the kindlier judgments of the heart. It was
not a question of expediency. It was one of affection. Had his parents
been ruled by the icy processes of a certain brand of common sense, they
might have despised and neglected him because he was not a creditable
representative of their kind. However, it was not so. Being ruled by the
gentler spirit of parental love, they cared for him a little more tenderly
than for any other of their children.
There is a reason. It is the fact that love is so constituted that it
finds joy in bearing burdens. It deliberately reaches out to help the
poorest and most unfortunate. It lavishes itself on those from whom it can
expect nothing save gratitude in return. The feelings of the heart
constitute the only coin in circulation in love’s domain.
Day after day an aged mother sat in her chair by the window. Her faded
eyes looked continually out upon the street. One might have thought that
they were looking at the stream of passers-by. It was not so. She could
hardly see the friends and neighbors as they came and went. She was really
looking back over the long vista of vanished years. She was seeing
departed faces, and listening to voices long hushed by the
blanketing clay.
A day came when she could no longer sit at the window. The thin old frame
that was her body had grown too weak to support itself in a chair, so she
lay upon her bed. Neglected? No. She was more tenderly cared for than
ever. She was a great care for the tender, loving hands that ministered to
her, but her very weakness and helplessness called the louder to loving
hearts and they responded.
One day the worn-out machinery of her physical body stopped running. At
evening time it had suddenly grown light, and then the darkness had
fallen. The old face was the picture of peace, with its closed eyes and a
certain satisfied expression upon its features.
A wise friend came and stood in the darkened room with the daughter who
had faithfully cared for the aged one while she lived. She said to her:
“I know how many times your arms will ache for the burden that has been
taken from them.”
She knew the law of love. It craves burdens to bear. When it has carried
a heavy load through years of time and that load is suddenly lifted from
its shoulders, it does not rejoice. It weeps and wishes for the burden
back again. This is a part of its strange, beautiful nature. Without this
nature it would not be love. The world has gone on and the race has
accomplished something of an upward climb because love has always been
among us, lifting, pushing, and helping. Without it we should still be a
race of savages.
A little blind girl walked in the park day after day. She stepped among
flowers that she had never seen. She listened to the birds, though she did
not know what they looked like. She lived in a world the beauty or
ugliness of which she had no power to realize. She was always led about by
the same hand—that of her father. He was patient and faithful. He seemed
to be trying to do all that could be done to compensate for the great lack
in her life. Since joy could not find its way in through her eyes, he did
what he could to help a little more of it to trickle in through her heart.
He succeeded, for across her sightless face occasionally flashed a
brightness announcing the arrival of gladness within.
There were other children in the family. All save this one were in full
possession of their normal powers. The logical thing, after a fashion,
would have been for the hearts of the parents to incline toward the
well-favored. However, such was not the type of logic that prevailed. The
heart of love does not lavish its affection upon those who have no need.
It pours itself out for those who need help and care. Therefore, this
sightless child was more tenderly cared for than any one of the rest.
It was in accordance with an established law. The troubled heart is a
magnet to the spirit of affection. Moreover, the very toil and sacrifice
spent for an object of love beget a greater devotion. The greater care
one needs the more he is loved.
It is so among men because it is so with God. We are made in His image,
and our normal feelings and efforts are only a poor human struggle to
be like Him.
A beautiful thing is said in the opening sentences of the Bible. The
barren picture of the first stage of creation is first sketched. It is
said that the earth was waste, and void, and that darkness was upon the
face of the deep. Then comes the significant sentence. It relates that
the Spirit of God brooded upon the face of the waters.
This is the explanation of all the progress that has been achieved since.
The waste became order, the void became substance, and the darkness became
light. Gradually civilization established itself, and the world keeps
moving on toward the realization of its better day. Some time we shall see
the realization of the promise of a new heaven and a new earth in which no
sin or sorrow shall be known. There will be just one explanation. God has
brooded in love over every shadow, and sin, and sorrow that we have ever
had, and His love has always struggled on with us to better things.
One day when Jesus showed some special solicitude for those whom the
correct and the respectable despised, He answered the criticism of His
friends by saying that it was not the well but the sick who needed a
physician. Such is the law of love. The heart of the world’s Saviour went
out first to those who needed His care most. It was love looking for a
burden to bear.
One evening time Jesus prayed in a garden. He was looking at the whole
world that night as He had looked at the city when He wept over it. He was
the divine spirit brooding that night over the needs of a race. Next
morning He hung upon the cross. He was only going to the limit of the last
bitter extremity for those He loved. Why do we call Him the world’s
highest example of love? Because He was the world’s outstanding
burden-bearer.
Love is the sweetest and the costliest thing in the world. It is the
sweetest because it is the spirit and atmosphere of heaven. It is the
costliest because its arms are always aching for loads to carry.