[{"data":1,"prerenderedAt":4},["ShallowReactive",2],{"reading-0815":3},"AUGUST 15\r\nThrough many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of God (Acts 1422).\r\nThe best things of life come out of wounding. Wheat is crushed\r\nbefore it becomes bread. Incense must be cast upon the fire before    odors are set free. The ground must be broken with the sharp plough before it is ready to receive the seed. It is the broken heart that\r\npleases God. The sweetest joys in life are the fruits of sorrow.\r\nHuman nature seems to need suffering to fit it for being a blessing to the world.\r\nBeside my cottage door it grows,\r\nThe loveliest, daintiest flower that blows, A sweet briar rose.\r\nAt dewy mom or twilight's close,  The rarest perfume from it flows, This strange wild rose.\r\nBut when the rain-drops on it beat,\r\nAh, then, its odors grow more sweet, About my feet.\r\nOfttimes with loving tenderness,\r\nIts soft green leaves I gently press, In sweet caress.\r\nA still more wondrous fragrance flows\r\nThe more my fingers close And crush the rose.\r\nDear Lord, oh, let my life be so\r\nIts perfume when tempests blow, The sweeter flow.\r\nAnd should it be Thy blessed will, With crushing grief my soul to fill,  Press harder still.\r\nAnd while its dying fragrance flows\r\nI'll whisper low, \"He loves and knows His crushed briar rose.\"\r\nIf you aspire to be a son of consolation; if you would partake of\r\nthe priestly gift of sympathy; if you would pour something beyond  commonplace consolation into a tempted heart, if you would pass through the intercourse of daily life with the delicate tact that\r\nnever inflicts pain; you must be content to pay the price of a costly\r\neducation--like Him, you must suffer. --F. W. Robertson.",1783499793301]