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The words of our Lord are often swords quick and powerful and sharper than any two-edged sword. Sometimes they are pearls, sometimes seed pearls, easily overlooked, but how beautiful when found. His words about the candle, “and it giveth light unto all that are in the house,” are precious seed pearls. The candlelight will shine through the windows on the people who pass in the street, but it has first lighted all who are in the house. When candles are so arranged that their light is chiefly for the street, there is sure to be fret for the people in the house. But even this can be turned to heavenly uses.
In a certain Indian hospital there was at one time a candle whose light may have been directed to the world out of doors but certainly did not shine much on the indoor folk. And for them life was sometimes difficult. One day something was said to a younger helper which all but drew forth a flashing retort. At that moment this came: “See in it a chance to die.” The word was spoken inwardly, but it was far more clearly heard than many a word addressed to the outward ear. See in it—in this provoking, in this that should not have been—a chance to die to self and the pride of self, to that in you which would strike in self-defence. See in anything that rouses you to claim your “rights,” even to see them or to consider them at all, see in it a chance to die. Welcome anything that calls you to your only true position, “I am crucified with Christ.”
A crucified life cannot be self-assertive. It cannot protect itself. It cannot be startled into resentful words. The cup that is full of sweetness cannot spill bitter drops however sharply knocked. Lord, fill my cup with sweetness. Keep very far from me the juice of the gall—to be brought to that prayer is to be blessed by the flowers of God on our mountain.
Often our edelweiss is an enriching friendship: “For every guest thy heart receiveth, the Lord Himself doth open in thy heart another room. It is as if Christ handed to us Himself the key of each newly discovered chamber, saying, ‘Let us together love to the best end, the dear soul who enters here.’ As love grows we discover further and further the capacity of the house of our soul. There is no limit to the number or kind of ‘these My brethren,’ to whom we give the freedom of this city without walls.”
And there is no limit to love. We were never meant to be like a pool of water which grows just a little shallower with every pebble dropped into it. A city of many houses, a house with many rooms—that is what we are meant to be. The rooms do not impinge on one another; they grow, each a perfect thing, like the cell of a honeybee in the comb. And to each friend is a cell into which no other ever enters. For as in Aaron’s breastplate each precious stone had a name engraved upon it, each set in an “inclosing” of gold, “And they shall be upon Aaron’s heart when he goeth in before the Lord,” so it is with the jewels of friendship: each several jewel has its name engraved upon it, each is set in its golden inclosing, and they are all upon our heart when we go in before the Lord.
New guests welcomed into our city without walls, new precious stones, new powers of loving—those are among the starriest flowers to be found on any Matterhorn.