| Things to Live For |
Chapter 5 |
Page 5 |
The light of good cheer that shines in our face as we pass victoriously through the hard things of our condition puts hope into other discouraged hearts. The faith that fails not when things seem dark, that meets sorrow and suffers, but is not crushed, helps the faith of others who are in like experiences. Life is contagious. Courage in one struggler makes al others who know him braver. Joy in one spirit kindles joy in many other spirits. The ministry of influence is silent, but it never intermits. By day and by night it goes on, while men wake and while they sleep. Even death does not interrupt it; but when the voice is hushed, when the hands are folded, it continues to bless and inspire others.
Not long since in a great city an aged Christian woman closed her earthly life. She had lived always I very plain circumstances. She had enjoyed only the most ordinary privileges of education. She had no peculiar gift for any distinct form f Christian activity. She had never taught a Sunday school class, nor led a woman’s prayer meeting, nor taken part in a missionary society, nor been connected with a temperance union or any other sort of organized association. She had never been recognized by her friends as an active worker in any capacity. But for sixty of her eighty years she had been a true, earnest, and sincere Christian. She had been a faithful wife, and a loving, self denying mother. She had brought up her family in the fear of the Lord. She had lived a quiet, patient, gentle life.
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