April 10

CHRIST the “CHIEF among ten thousand” (Song 5:10). Dr. A.T. Schofield tells the following: Some years ago I went down to the banks of the Severn to visit a poor girl dying of tuberculosis in a cottage of two rooms on the river’s bank. I found the river in flood, through which I waded, and when I opened the door I found the kitchen knee-deep in water. The girl I knew was dying alone upstairs, to which a strip wooden staircase gave access. Here, I felt, was a case that called for all my powers to cheer; I wondered how best to comfort the sufferer. I needn’t have worried. As I appeared in the bedroom, she eagerly looked at me, her rare visitor. With deep, earnest eyes, and with a heavenly smile, without the slightest greeting, she said, “He is the chiefest among ten thousand, the Altogether Lovely.” I found myself in the presence of one of God’s holy priests, offering up her morning sacrifice. She was not in the swamped cottage, but seated far away with her Lord in the heavenlies.

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