Such was the bold--the _unkind_ reasoning of the mourner. It was the reasoning of a finite creature. Ah! if she could but have looked into the workings of that infinite Heart she was ungenerously upbraiding, how differently would she have broached her tearful suit! _Her_ exclamation is--"Why this _unkind_ absence?" _His_ comment on that _same_ absence to His disciples is _this_--"I was _glad_ for your sakes that I was _not_ there!" How often are _God_ and _man_ thus in strange antagonism, with regard to earthly dispensations! Man, as he arraigns the rectitude of the Divine procedure, exclaiming--"How unaccountable this dealing! How baffling this mystery! Where is now my God?" This sickness--why prolonged? This thorn in the flesh--why still buffeting? This family blank--why permitted? Why the most treasured and useful life taken--the blow aimed where it cut most severely and levelled lowest? Hush the secret atheism! This trial, whatever it be, has this grand motto written upon it in characters of living light;--we can read it on anguished pillows--aching hearts--ay, on the very portals of the tomb--"_This_ is for the glory of God, that the Son of God may be glorified thereby!" At the very moment we are mourning what are called "_dark_ providences"--"untoward calamities"--"strokes of misfortune"--"unmitigated evils"--Jesus has a different verdict;--"I am _glad_ for your sakes." The absence at Jordan--the still more unaccountable lingering for two days in the same place after the message had been sent, instead of hastening direct to Bethany, all was well and wisely ordered. And although Martha's upbraidings were now received in forbearing silence, her Saviour afterwards, in a calmer moment, read the rebuke--"Said I not unto thee, if thou wouldst _believe_, thou shouldst see the glory of God?" It is indeed a comforting assurance in all trials, that God has some holy and wise end to subserve. He never stirs a ripple on the waters, but for His own glory, or the good of others. The delay on the present occasion, though protracting for a time the sorrows of the bereaved, was intended for the benefit of the Church in every age, and for the more immediate benefit of the disciples. _They_ were destined in a few brief weeks also to be desolate survivors--to mourn a Brother dearer still! He who had been to them Friend--Father--Brother, all in one, was to be, like Lazarus, laid silent in a Jerusalem sepulchre. The Lord of Life was to be the victim of Death! His body was to be transfixed to a malefactor's cross, and consigned to a lonely grave! He knew the shock that awaited their faith. He knew, as this terrible hour drew on, how needful some overpowering visible demonstration would be of His mastery over the tomb. _Now_ a befitting opportunity occurred in the case of their friend Lazarus to read the needed lesson. "I was glad for your sakes, ... to the intent ye might believe."