Page:Philochristus, Abbott, 1878.djvu/377

Rh my brethren: in the midst of the congregation will I praise thee. For he hath not despised nor abhorred the affliction of the afflicted; neither hath he hid his face from him, but when he cried unto him he heard." So I wondered whether Jesus, in speaking those last words, had in his mind all the words of the psalm, and "Perchance," I said, "in saying the first words, he signified (in his sore weakness when the breath was departing from him) that he desired to say the whole; for the first words are but as a title to the whole. Wherefore, perchance, beneath the sense of the forsaking, there was a deeper sense that God did not despise the affliction of the afflicted." Then I mused again concerning the words of the Psalm, and especially on these, "When he cried unto him, he heard." And I looked up to the moon and the stars in heaven, which are the work of the hand of God, and I asked whether it was possible that the Maker of so beautiful an order in heaven should suffer disorder to prevail upon the earth; and my heart said that it could not prevail for ever. "Therefore," said I, "God must needs have heard Jesus of Nazareth when he cried unto Him. Yea, though He seemed not to hear, yet must He have heard indeed. Yea, even though Jesus be dead, yea, even though Jesus be not the Messiah, yet surely the Lord must have heard Jesus; for not to have heard him, would have been not to be God."

Then rose I up and stood and stretched out my hands in prayer unto the Lord with whom all things are possible, that He would shew forth His mercy upon me; and behold, when I tried to pray, my lips would shape forth no other prayer, but that He would bring back Jesus unto us, even though it were for a moment of time, that we might look upon him and know that he still lived. And at one moment I rebuked myself because the thing seemed