Trusting the Lord Through Trials
By L. B. Abbey
DEAR BRETHREN AND SISTERS: It is a long time since I have sent in my testimony to witness for the Lord. Nevertheless I have often been cheered while reading the heart-stirring epistles sent far and near through this silent medium, the Review. Its weekly visits are more than welcomed by us, here in this place. We greet its coming with gladness. Its reading is like the cooling water-brook to the way-worn traveler, as he sits down in the shadow of the rock to quench his thirst. Deep and sore have been the trials which I have been called to pass through for the last eighteen months, but the Lord has been my support and trust, and my only hope. He alone doth know all our tribulation, and how to make a way for our escape; when tempted and tried to the utmost, he will come to our deliverance. O, how good is the name of the Lord! he is better to us than all our fears. "Who is like unto thee, O Lord, among the gods? Who is like thee, glorious in holiness, fearful in praises, doing wonders." O, dear brethren and sisters, how ought the name of our God to be exalted, for the great salvation wrought out by Jesus Christ, and offered so freely to poor, degraded man. I feel that I have great need to humble myself before the Lord. My prayer is, O Lord, help me to get down where thou canst bestow this full salvation upon me, even me. It cheers my heart when I read the communications from those who write on the subject of holiness. This is what we must obtain ere we can enter those pearly gates of which we read in the blessed word of God. O, pray for me that I may be among those who shall have an inheritance on the new earth, where there will be no more sorrow, neither sighing, nor any more pain; not one of the inhabitants will ever say, I am sick. O, how cheering to have this blessed hope within our hearts, that we shall one day stand upon the mount Zion, and all our trials ended. O, blessed thought! how it buoys the fainting spirit up, to contemplate the joys laid up for those who endure as seeing him who is invisible. "The things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal." O, give me of those things which are not seen, that I may with all the redeemed sing the victor's song.
L. B. ABBEY.
Hubbardsville, N. Y.