Christie Redfern's Troubles

by Margaret M. Robertson

“So that it couldna be to please her,” thought Christie. “What if God should hear my prayer, after all?”

The thought was quite as startling as it was pleasant. Then she wondered if Effie had brought the book. She did not like to ask her. She did so want to believe that she might fall back on God’s help in all her troubles; but if Effie had not brought the book she could not be sure that her prayer had been heard. “Could it be possible?” she said to herself. It seemed altogether too good, too wonderful, to be true. And yet there were verses in the Bible very plain, very easy to be understood—“Ask, and ye shall receive; seek, and ye shall find;” and many more besides that.

She repeated the words slowly and earnestly. That must be true, she thought. Every one believed the Bible. And yet how few live and pray and trust as though they really do believe it! She had heard discussions, many and long, between her father and some of their neighbours, on difficult passages of Scripture and difficult points of doctrine. She had heard the Scriptures quoted to support doctrines very different in their nature. She had heard passages commented upon and explained away to suit the views of the speaker, until she had come to think, sometimes, that the most obvious meaning of a text could not possibly be the true one; and she said to herself, what if she had been taking comfort from these promises too soon? What if they meant something else, or meant what they seemed to mean only to those to whom they were spoken? What if, for some unknown, mysterious reason, she were among those who had no part nor lot in the matter?—among those who hearing hear not, or who fail to understand? And before she was aware, the hopefulness of the last half-hour was vanishing away before the troubled and doubtful thoughts that rushed upon her.

“I wish there was any one that I could ask about it! I wonder if Effie would know? I’ll see if she has brought me the book; and that will be something. Maybe the book-man could tell me all about it. Only I don’t like to ask him.”

She turned her eyes towards him, as the thought passed through her mind. His face was plain and wrinkled and brown; but, for all that, it was a very pleasant face to look at. It was a grave face, even when he smiled; but it was never other than a pleasant one. There was something in it that brought to Christie’s mind her favourite verse about “the peace that passeth all understanding.”

“He has it, I do believe,” she said, while she quietly watched him as he listened or talked.

“It must be a weary life you live,” Aunt Elsie was saying, “going about from morning till night, in all weathers, with those books of yours; a weary life and a thankless.”

“Do you think so?” said Mr Craig, with a smile. “I don’t think it is a harder life than most of the people that I see are living. No harder than the farmers have during this busy harvest-time. No harder than the pedlars of tin-ware and dry goods have, that go about the country in all weathers.”

“But it’s different with the farmer, who tills his own land. He is working to some end. Every tree he cuts, every sheaf he reaps and gathers in, is so much gain to him; and even these pedlars must have a measure of enjoyment when their sales are good. They are gaining their living by their travels.”

“Well, so am I, for that matter,” said Mr Craig, still smiling. “I am on equal terms with them there; though I cannot say that the greatest part of the pleasure I have in my work arises from the gain it is to me. But why do you say it is a thankless work?”