Praise be to God, you are confirmed and flourishing in the Faith, and partaking of your portion from that heavenly table, and are receiving your benefits in both worlds. 35: The passing of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, may our lives ... (157) The passing of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, may our lives be a sacrifice for His meekness, was the ultimate calamity, the most great disaster. The light has fled our hearts, and our souls are wedded to sorrow, and no power in all the world can furnish any consolation, save only the power that comes from the steadfastness of the believers and their deep-rooted faith, and their unity, and their love for one another. Only these can lessen the pain and quiet the anguish. Although to outward seeming the Sun of the Covenant has hidden Himself behind the clouds, and the Orb of the Testament is concealed, and on the holy horizon of glory, He has now set, and is lost to view—still His rays are shining from out His hidden place, and forever will His light shed down its splendours. For ever and ever will He, with all that invisible grace, and those bestowals of the spirit, lead the seeker onward, and guide the yearning, and ravish the hearts of the lovers. The Will and Testament of ‘Abdu’l-Bahá is His decisive decree; it gathers the believers together; it preserves their unity; it ensures the protection of the Faith of God. It designates a specific Centre, irrefutably and in writing establishing Shoghi Effendi as Guardian of the Faith and Chosen Branch, so that his name is recorded in the Preserved Tablet, by the fingers of grace and bounty. How grateful should we be that such a bounty was bestowed, and such a favour granted. Now is the time to arise to serve the Faith with all our might, that our loyalty may be clearly proven, and that we may perfectly, to the fullest extent and in minutest detail, carry out the requirements of self-sacrifice. It is my hope that one and all, we shall succeed in this. 36: The ascension of Him Who was the Temple ... (158) The ascension of Him Who was the Temple of the Covenant, the setting of Him Who was the Orb of harmony, ‘Abdu’l-Bahá, may our lives be sacrificed for the wrongs He suffered, was the most dire calamity, and the most dread of ordeals. It dissolved our very hearts, it laid low the very pillars of our being. It made our eyes to shed tears of blood, and our sighs and the sound of our weeping reached upward to the Concourse on High. Then did a sea of anguish roll up great waves of grief, and a whirlwind of sorrow swept over the peoples of the earth.