THE FELLOWSHIP OF HIS SUFFERINGS.
By H. E. Butler
“THAT I may know the fellowship of his sufferings.” Was there ever so strange an ambition as that? Was there ever a seeker for knowledge who deliberately put before himself so unusual an object of desire? But this man writes it, talks it, lives it, as if to suffer with one who had only a little before been condemned as a malefactor were the grandest, noblest thing to which a human being might aspire. And he says it, knowing from his own experience what it means to suffer, and from his knowledge of the condemned Jesus what he suffered. There is nothing strange in the desire of men to share the honors of another. It does not require much persuasion for the eager followers of a successful political leader to accept the rewards he may have it in his power to offer. But the sorrows of defeat, the pains of ungratified desire, are not much coveted. Our songs, even in the Christian pilgrimage, are rather more of the crowns than of the crosses, and there are usually more who are willing to “sit and sing themselves away to everlasting bliss” than to go through the “valley of Baca” with the Saviour in his pain. And yet we get glimpses enough along our lifeway to show us a little of what the apostle means when he says that he wants to share in the sufferings of Christ. The old patriarch knew something of it when his eldest son threw away his birthright for a mess of pottage. Lot knew something of it when the temptations of Sodom had destroyed his own sons. David knew a great deal of it when the beautiful boy for whom he would have died, became a traitor and died in rebellion against him. All along the track which men have made, you find the monuments which they have erected to perpetuate the memory of those who have suffered for another’s good. In fact, if Christ loved, he must suffer; for, while sin exists, love and pain are in a plain way indissolubly joined. Love is the impelling motive to painful service. Joy comes in the bearing of pain for another’s sake. In a large sense it is forever true that he who saves another can not save himself. The mother can not save her weary body if she saves her sick7child. The friend can not save himself from distress if he knows the danger of one he loves. Indeed, the man or woman does not know what a glorious thing it is to live, who does not know what is the joy of work, and sorrow, and hurt, and pain, for the sake of love.—H. E. Butler, in N. Y. Observer.