Letters and Manuscripts — Volume 8 (1893)

Lt 37, 1893

Lons, Sister

Napier, New Zealand

September 4, 1893

This letter is published in entirety in DG 223-224.

Dear Sister Lons,

I am happy to have made your acquaintance and my heart linked with your heart, and also with the widow, Sr. Brown. We have all three of us been left in widowhood, and we have been much blessed of God, in that He hath not failed us in our times of trial. He has been to us a present help in every time of need. There has been in our individual experience the proving of God—resignation under affliction, patience when tried most severely, and humble childlike reliance upon God. 8LtMs, Lt 37, 1893, par. 1

We have learned in the midst of dark providences that it was not wise to have a will or way of my own, and to cast not reflection and surmises on the divine faithfulness. I feel that we are those who can understand and sympathize with each other. We are bound together by the grace of Jesus Christ and in the bonds of Christian sympathies made sacred by afflictions. 8LtMs, Lt 37, 1893, par. 2

We will, if we meet no more upon earth, have tender, unforgotten memories of our short association with the family at Long Point. I am glad to have met you. I believe that in the providence of God that it is ordered that you be a member of the Brown family. In your association with them the Lord has made you an instrument of righteousness, a blessing especially to Sister Brown. I have very kindly, tender feelings for you, and especially for Sister Brown, understanding the sorrows of her life. 8LtMs, Lt 37, 1893, par. 3

Afflictions are oft mercies in disguise. We know not what we might have been without them. When God in His mysterious providence overthrows all our cherished plans, and we may receive sorrow in the place of joy, we will bow in submission and say, “Thy will, O God, be done.” We must and we will ever cherish a calm, religious trust in one who loves us, who gave His life for us. “The Lord will command his lovingkindness in the daytime, and in the night his song shall be with me, and my prayer unto the God of my life. I will say unto God my rock, Why hast thou forgotten me? Why go I mourning because of the oppression of the enemy? ... Why art thou cast down O my soul? Why art thou disquieted within me? Hope thou in God: for I shall yet praise Him, who is the health of my countenance, and my God.” [Psalm 42:8, 9, 11.] 8LtMs, Lt 37, 1893, par. 4

The Lord looks upon our afflictions. He graciously and discriminately metes them out and apportions them. As a refiner of silver He watches us every moment until the purification is complete. The furnace is to purify and refine, not to destroy and consume. He will cause those who put their trust in Him to sing of mercies in the midst of judgments. 8LtMs, Lt 37, 1893, par. 5

He is ever watching to impart, when most needed, new and fresh blessings, strength in the hour of weakness, succor in the hour of danger, friends in the hour of loneliness, sympathy, human and divine in the hour of sorrow. We are homeward bound. He that loveth us so much as to die for us hath builded for us a city. The new Jerusalem is our place of rest. There will be no sadness in the city of God. No wail of sadness. No dirge of crushed hopes and buried affection shall ever more be heard. 8LtMs, Lt 37, 1893, par. 6

God bless you, my dear much respected sister. 8LtMs, Lt 37, 1893, par. 7