Your wrath lies hard upon me, and You have afflicted me with all Your waves. (Psalm 88:7)
I have often marveled at the strange comfort persons offer you when they say, “Ah, there are others who suffer more than you do.” Am I a demon, then? Am I expected to rejoice at the news of other people’s miseries? Far otherwise! I am pained to think there should be sharper smarts than mine, and my sympathy increases my own woe! I can conceive of a fiend in torment finding solace in the belief that others are tortured with a yet fiercer flame, but surely such diabolical comfort should not be offered to Christians!
It shows our deep depravity of heart, that we can extract comfort out of the miseries of others, and yet I am afraid we rightly judge human nature when we offer it water from that putrid well! There is, however, a form of comfort akin to it, but of far more legitimate origin—a consolation honorable and Divine. There was ONE upon whom God’s Wrath pressed very sorely. There was ONE who was, in truth, afflicted with all God’s waves! That One is our Brother, a Man like ourselves, the dearest lover of our souls, and because He has known and suffered all this, He can sympathize with us this morning, in whatever tribulation may beat upon us!