| The Glory of the Common Life |
Chapter 12 |
Page 7 |
She awoke with a sudden start, and looked into the boy’s face. He had waked, too, and was looking intently at her. The passion of love came into her heart, and in her new emotion she bent down and kissed him as tenderly as ever she had kissed child of her own. The boy gave her a smile, so sweet; she had never seen one like it before. From that moment a wonderful change came over the child. Love had transformed him from peevishness and fretfulness into gentle quiet and beauty.
This is the vision we have in St. Paul’s words – “The weak brother perisheth for whom Christ died – perisheth through thy strength, thy goodness.” He is weak, and perishes for want of your love, he for whom Christ died. How the picture startles us! Surely we cannot think unkindly, harshly, or neglectfully any more of the weak brother, when we remember that the Son of God gave himself to redeem him. There are lives all about us which seem to have lost their beauty and their splendour. They appear dull and lusterless. Yet in them sleep glorious possibilities. They need only the touch of love to bring out in them the divine loveliness.
They are all about us – these weak brothers. They have not our strength. They are unable to stand in the front rank to do great things. They are weak in their disposition – full of scruples, not easy to get along with. They are weak in their character – easily tempted, falling back readily into the old, bad ways. They are weak in their business life, never getting on. We need more and more to become helpers of the weak, whatever the form of their weakness may be. We ought, with our disciplined power, to be a home, a shelter, a refuge, for all weak or weary ones who come under our influence. Let them find love in us, for they have never found it in any one else. Let the weakest find love in us, though no other where have they had any welcome. The sweetest and the strongest should be the gentlest. Let us go slower, because the weak brother cannot go fast. Do not get vexed with the weak brother’s scruples or unreasonable ways. Be sure that no weak brother shall ever perish through your superior strength and knowledge. Remember always that Christ died for the weak brother.
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