What a sweet answer to an anxious question! Tonight, let us rejoice in it. O church of God, there are good things in store for you! Your time of travail will soon be over. Your children will be brought home. Your captivity will end. Bear the rod patiently for now, and even in the darkness, still trust in God—for his love burns toward you.

God loves his church with a love too deep for human imagination. He loves her with all his infinite heart. Therefore, take courage, children of God! How can she be far from prosperity when God himself speaks "good words and comfortable words" to her?

And what are these comfortable words? The prophet tells us: "I am jealous for Jerusalem and for Zion with a great jealousy." The Lord loves his church so much that he cannot bear to see her go astray to others. And when she has done so? He cannot endure that she should suffer too much or too heavily. He will not have his enemies afflict her—he is displeased with them because they increase her misery.

Here is the truth: when God seems most to leave his church, his heart is warm toward her. History proves it! Whenever God uses a rod to chasten his servants, he always breaks it afterward, as if he loathes the rod which gave his children pain. "As a father pities his children, so the Lord pities those who fear him."

God has not forgotten us because he smites us. His blows are no evidence of want of love. They prove the opposite!

And if this is true for the church collectively, it is of necessity true for every individual member. You may fear that the Lord has passed you by. But it is not so! He who counts the stars and calls them by their names is in no danger of forgetting his own children. He knows your case as thoroughly as if you were the only creature he ever made, or the only saint he ever loved.

Approach him and be at peace.