Chapter 16
Prescription for Heartache
"PLEASE GIVE ME a prescription for heartache."
This curious and rather pathetic request was made by a man
who had been informed by his doctor that the feelings of
disability of which he complained were not of a physical
nature. His trouble lay in an inability to rise above sorrow.
He was suffering from "an ache in his personality" as a result
of grief.
His doctor advised him to secure spiritual consultation and
treatment. So continuing to use the terminology of medicine,
he repeated his question, "Is there a spiritual prescription
which will reduce my constant inner suffering? I realize that
sorrow comes to everyone and I should be able to meet it the
same as others. I have tried my best but find no peace."
Again he asked with a sad, slow smile, "Give me a
prescription for heartache."
There is indeed a "prescription" for heartache. One element
in the prescription is physical activity. The sufferer must
avoid the temptation to sit and brood. A sensible program
which substitutes physical activity for such fruitless brooding
reduces the strain on the area of the mind where we reflect,
philosophize, and suffer mental pain. Muscular activity
utilizes another part of the brain and therefore shifts the
strain and gives relief.
An old country lawyer who had a sound philosophy and
much wisdom told a sorrowing woman that the best
medicine for a broken heart is "to take a scrubbing brush and
get down on your knees and go to work. The best medicine
for a man," he declared, "is to get an ax and chop wood until
physically tired." While this is not guaranteed to be a
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complete cure for heartache, yet it does tend to mitigate such
suffering.
Whatever the character of your heartache, one of the first
steps is to resolve to escape from any defeatist situation
which may have been created around yourself, even though it
is difficult to do so, and return once again to the normal
course of your life. Get back into the main stream of life's
activities. Take up your old associations. Form new ones.
Get busy walking, riding, swimming, playing — get the blood
to coursing through your system. Lose yourself in some
worthwhile project. Fill your days with creative activity and
emphasize the physical aspect of activity. Employ healthy
mind- relieving busyness, but be sure that it is of a
worthwhile and constructive nature. Superficial escapism
through feverish activity merely deadens pain temporarily
and does not heal, as, for example, parties and drinking.
An excellent and normal release from heartache is to give
way to grief. There is a foolish point of view current today
that one should not show grief, that it is not proper to cry or
express oneself through the natural mechanism of tears and
sobbing. This is a denial of the law of nature. It is natural to
cry when pain or sorrow comes. It is a relief mechanism
provided in the body by Almighty God and should be used.
To restrain grief, to inhibit it, to bottle it up, is to fail to use
one of God's means for eliminating the pressure of sorrow.
Like every other function of the human body and nervous
system, this must be controlled, but it should not be denied
altogether. A good cry by either man or woman is a release
from heartache. I should warn, however, that this mechanism
should not be used unduly nor allowed to become a habitual
process. Should that happen, it partakes of the nature of
abnormal grief and could become a psychosis. Unrestraint of
any kind should not be allowed.
I receive many letters from people whose loved ones have
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died. They tell me that it is very difficult for them to go to
the same places they were in the habit of frequenting
together or to be with the same people with whom they
associated as a couple or as a family. Therefore they avoid
the old-time places and friends.
I regard this as a serious mistake. A secret of curing
heartache is to be as normal and natural as possible. This
does not imply disloyalty or indifference. This policy is
important in avoiding a state of abnormal grief. Normal
sorrow is a natural process and its normality is evidenced by
the ability of the individual to return to his usual pursuits and
responsibilities and continue therein as formerly.
The deeper remedy for heartache, of course, is the curative
comfort supplied by trust in God.
Inevitably the basic prescription for heartache is to turn to
God in an attitude of faith and empty the mind and heart to
Him. Perseverance in the act of spiritual self-emptying will
finally bring healing to the broken heart. This generation,
which has suffered fully as much if not more heartache than
people in preceding eras, needs to relearn that which the
wisest men of all time have known, namely, that there is no
healing of the pain suffered by humanity except through the
benign ministrations of faith.
One of the greatest souls of the ages was Brother Lawrence,
who said, "If in this life we would know the serene peace of
Paradise, we must school ourselves in familiar, humble, and
loving converse with God." It is not advisable to attempt to
carry the burden of sorrow and mental pain without Divine
help, for its weight is more than the personality can bear. The
simplest and most effective of all prescriptions for heartache
then is to practice the presence of God. This will soothe the
ache in your heart and ultimately heal the wound. Men and
women who have experienced great tragedy tell us that this
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prescription is effective.
Another profoundly curative element in the prescription for
heartache is to gain a sound and satisfying philosophy of life
and death and deathlessness. For my part, when I gained the
unshakable belief that there is no death, that all life is
indivisible, that the here and hereafter are one, that time and
eternity are inseparable, that this is one unobstructed
universe, then I found the most satisfying and convincing
philosophy of my entire life.
These convictions are based upon sound foundations, the
Bible for one. I believe that the Bible gives us a very subtle,
and as will be proved ultimately, a scientific series of
insights into the great question, "What happens when a man
leaves this world?" Also the Bible very wisely tells us that
we know these truths by faith. Henri Bergson, the
philosopher, says that the surest way into truth is by
perception, by intuition, by reasoning to a certain point, then
by taking a "mortal leap," and by intuition attaining the truth.
You come to some glorious moment where you simply
"know." That is the way it happened to me.
I am absolutely, wholeheartedly, and thoroughly convinced
of the truth of which I write and have no doubt of it, even to
an infinitesimal degree. I arrived at this positive faith
gradually, yet there came one moment when I knew.
This philosophy will not ward off the sorrow which comes
when a loved one dies and physical, earthly separation
ensues. But it will lift and dissipate grief. It will fill your
mind with a deep understanding of the meaning of this
inevitable circumstance. And it will give you a deep
assurance that you have not lost your loved one. Live on this
faith and you will be at peace and the ache will leave your
heart.
Take into your mind and heart one of the most marvelous
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texts in the Holy Bible — "Eye hath not seen, nor ear heard,
neither have entered into the heart of man, the things which
God hath prepared for them that love Him." (I Corinthians
2 : 9 )
This means that you have never seen, no matter what you
have seen, however wonderful it is, you have never seen
anything to compare with the marvelous things that God has
prepared for those who love Him and who put their trust in
Him. Moreover, it says that you have never heard anything to
compare with the astonishing marvels that God has laid up
for those who follow His teachings and live according to His
spirit. Not only have you never seen nor ever heard but you
have never even dimly imagined what He is going to do for
you. This sentence goes all out in promising comfort and
immortality and reunion and every good thing to those who
center their lives in God.
After many years of reading the Bible and being intimately
connected with all the phases of the lives of hundreds of
people, I wish to state unequivocally that I have found this
Biblical promise to be absolutely true. It applies even to this
world. People who really practice living on a Christlike basis
have the most incredible things happen to them.
This passage also relates to the state of existence of those
now living on the other side and our relationship, while we
live, to those who have preceded us across that barrier which
we call death. I use the word "barrier" somewhat
apologetically. We have always thought of death as a barrier
with a concept of a separatist nature.
Scientists working today in the field of parapsychology and
extra-sensory perception and experimenting in precognition,
telepathy, clairvoyance (all of which were formerly
considered paraphernalia of the cranks, but which are now of
sound, scientific usage in the laboratories), are expressing
themselves as believing that the soul survives the barrier of
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time and space. In effect, we are on the edge of one of the
greatest scientific discoveries in history which will
substantiate, on a laboratory-exploratory basis, the existence
of the soul and its deathlessness.
For many years I have been accumulating a series of
incidents, the validity of which I accept and which bear out
the conviction that we live in a dynamic universe where life,
not death, is the basic principle. I have confidence in the
people who have described the following experiences and am
convinced that they indicate a world impinged upon or
intertwined with our own through the meshes of which
human spirits, on both sides of death, live in unbroken
fellowship. The conditions of life on the other side, as we
know them in mortality, are modified. Undoubtedly those
who have crossed to the other side dwell in a higher medium
than we do and their understanding is amplified beyond ours,
yet all the facts point to the continued existence of our loved
ones and the further fact that they are not far away, and still
another fact implied, but no less real, that we shall be
reunited with them. Meanwhile, we continue in fellowship
with those who dwell in the spirit world.
William James, one of America's greatest scholars, after a
lifetime of study said he was satisfied that the human brain is
only a medium for the soul's existence and that the mind as
now constituted will be exchanged at last for a brain that will
allow the owner to reach out into untapped areas of
understanding. As our spiritual being is amplified here on
earth and as we grow in age and experience we become more
conscious of this vaster world all around us, and when we die
it is only to enter into an enlarged capacity.
Euripides, one of the greatest thinkers of antiquity, was
convinced that the next life would be of infinitely greater
magnitude. Socrates shared the same concept. One of the
most comforting statements ever made was his remark, "No
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evil can befall a good man in this life or in the next."
Natalie Kalmus, scientific expert in technicolor, tells about
the death of her sister. The following account given by this
scientifically trained woman appeared in the inspirational
magazine Guicleposts.
Natalie Kalmus quotes her dying sister as saying, " 'Natalie,
promise me that you won't let them give me any drugs. I
realize that they are trying to help relieve my pain, but I want
to be fully aware of every sensation. I am convinced that
death will be a beautiful experience.'
"I promised. Alone, later, I wept, thinking of her courage.
Then as I tossed in bed on through the night, I realized that
what I thought to be a calamity my sister intended to be a
triumph.
"Ten days later the final hour drew near. I had been at her
bedside for hours. We had talked about many things, and
always I marveled at her quiet, sincere confidence in eternal
life. Not once did the physical torture overcome her spiritual
strength. This was something that the doctors simply hadn't
taken into account.
"'Dear kind God, keep my mind clear and give me peace,' she
had murmured over and over again during those last days.
"We had talked so long that I noticed she was drifting off to
to sleep. I left her quietly with the nurse and retired to get
some rest. A few minutes later I heard my sister's voice
calling for me. Quickly I returned to her room. She was
dying.
"I sat on her bed and took her hand. It was on fire. Then she
seemed to rise up in bed almost to a sitting position.
" 'Natalie,' she said, 'there are so many of them. There's
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Fred... and Ruth. ..what's she doing here? Oh, I know!'
"An electric shock went through me. She had said Ruth.
Ruth was her cousin who had died suddenly the week before.
But Eleanor had not been told of Ruth's sudden death.
"Chill after chill shot up and down my spine. I felt on the
verge of some powerful, almost frightening knowledge. She
had murmured Ruth's name.
"Her voice was surprisingly clear. 'It's so confusing. So many
of them!' Suddenly her arms stretched out as happily as when
she had welcomed me! 'I'm going up,' she said.
"Then she dropped her arms around my neck — and relaxed
in my arms. The will of her spirit had turned final agony into
rapture.
"As I laid her head back on the pillow, there was a warm,
peaceful smile on her face. Her golden-brown hair lay
carelessly on the pillow. I took a white flower from the vase
and placed it in her hair. With her petite, trim figure, her
wavy hair, the white flower, and the soft smile, she looked
once more — and permanently — just like a schoolgirl."
The mention of her cousin Ruth by the dying girl and the
evident fact that she saw her clearly is a phenomenon that
recurs again and again in the incidents which have come to
my attention. So repetitive is this phenomenon and so similar
are the characteristics of this experience as described by
many that it amounts to a substantial evidence that the people
whose names are called, whose faces are seen, are actually
present.
Where are they? What is their condition? What sort of body
have they? These are questions that are difficult. The idea of
a different dimension is probably the most tenable, or it may
be more accurate to believe that they live in a different
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frequency cycle.
It is impossible to see through the blades of an electric fan
when it is in a stationary position. At high speed, however,
the blades appear to be transparent. In the higher frequency
or the state in which our loved ones dwell, the impenetrable
qualities of the universe may open to the gaze of one passing
into the mysteries. In deep moments of our own lives it is
entirely possible that we enter to a degree at least into that
higher frequency. In one of the most beautiful lines in
English literature, Robert Ingersoll suggests this great truth,
"In the night of death, hope sees a star and listening love can
hear the rustle of a wing."
A famous neurologist tells of a man who was at death's door.
The dying man looked up at the physician sitting beside his
bed and began to call off names which the physician wrote
down. The doctor was personally unfamiliar with any name
mentioned. Later the physician asked the man's daughter,
"Who are these people? Your father spoke of them as if he
saw them."
"They are all relatives," she said, "who have been dead a
long time."
The physician said he believes his patient did see them.
Friends of mine, Mr. and Mrs. William Sage, lived in New
Jersey and I was often in their home. Mr. Sage, whom his
wife called Will, died first. A few years later, when Mrs.
Sage was on her deathbed, the most surprised look passed
across her face, and it lighted up in a wonderful smile as she
said, "Why, it is Will." That she saw him those about her bed
had no doubt whatsoever.
Arthur Godfrey, famous radio personality, tells of being
asleep in his bunk on a destroyer in World War I. Suddenly
his father stood beside him. He put out his hand, smiled, and
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said, "So long, son," and Godfrey answered, "So long, Dad."
Later he was awakened and given a cablegram telling him of
the death of his father. The time of his passing was given,
and it was the precise period during which Godfrey in his
sleep "saw" his father.
Mary Margaret McBride, also a famous radio personality,
was overwhelmed with grief upon the death of her mother.
They had been very close to each other. She awakened one
night and sat on the edge of her bed. Suddenly she had the
feeling, to use her own words, that "Mama was with me."
She did not see her mother nor hear her speak, but from that
time on, "I knew that my mother isn't dead — that she is near
by."
The late Rufus Jones, one of the most famous spiritual
leaders of our time, tells about his son Lowell who died at
twelve years of age. He was the apple of his father's eye. The
boy took sick when Dr. Jones was on the ocean bound for
Europe. The night before entering Liverpool, while lying in
his bunk, he experienced an indefinable, inexplainable
feeling of sadness. Then he said that he seemed to be
enveloped in the arms of God. A great feeling of peace and a
sense of a profound possession of his son came to him.
Upon landing in Liverpool he was advised that his son had
died, his death occurring at the precise hour when Dr. Jones
had felt a sense of God's presence and the everlasting
nearness of his son.
A member of my church, Mrs. Bryson Kalt, tells of an aunt
whose husband and three children were burned to death
when their house was destroyed by fire. The aunt was badly
burned but lived for three years. When finally she lay dying a
radiance suddenly came over her face. "It is all so beautiful,"
she said. "They are coming to meet me. Fluff up my pillows
and let me go to sleep."
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Mr. H. B. Clarke, an old friend of mine, was for many years
a construction engineer, his work taking him into all parts of
the world. He was of a scientific turn of mind, a quite
restrained, factual, unemotional type of man. I was called
one night by his physician, who said that he did not expect
him to live but a few hours. His heart action was slow and
the blood pressure was extraordinarily low. There was no
reflex action at all. The doctor gave no hope.
I began to pray for him, as did others. The next day his eyes
opened and after a few days he recovered his speech. His
heart action and blood pressure returned to normal. After he
recovered strength he said, "At some time during my illness
something very peculiar happened to me. I cannot explain it.
It seemed that I was a long distance away. I was in the most
beautiful and attractive place I have ever seen. There were
lights all about me, beautiful lights. I saw faces dimly
revealed, kind faces they were, and I felt very peaceful and
happy. In fact, I have never felt happier in my life.
"Then the thought came to me, 'I must be dying.' Then it
occurred to me, 'Perhaps I have died.' Then I almost laughed
out loud, and asked myself, 'Why have I been afraid of death
all my life? There is nothing to be afraid of in this.' "
"How did you feel about it?" I asked. "Did you want to come
back to life? Did you want to live, for you were not dead,
although the doctor felt that you were very close to death.
Did you want to live?"
He smiled and said, "It did not make the slightest difference.
If anything, I think I would have preferred to stay in that
beautiful place."
Hallucination, a dream, a vision — I do not believe so. I have
spent too many years talking to people who have come to the
edge of "something" and had a look across, who
unanimously have reported beauty, light, and peace, to have
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any doubt in my own mind.
The New Testament teaches the indestructibility of life in a
most interesting and simple manner. It describes Jesus after
His crucifixion in a series of appearances, disappearances,
and reappearances. Some saw Him and then He vanished out
of their sight. Then others saw Him and again He vanished.
It is as if to say, "You see me and then you do not see me."
This indicates that He is trying to tell us that when we do not
see Him, it does not mean He is not there. Out of sight does
not mean out of life.
Occasional mystical appearances which some experience
indicate the same truth, that He is near by. Did He not say,
"...because I live, ye shall live also." (John 14:19) In other
words, our loved ones who have died in this faith are also
near by and occasionally draw near to comfort us.
A boy serving in Korea wrote to his mother, saying, "The
strangest things happen to me. Once in a while at night,
when I am afraid, Daddy seems to be with me." Daddy had
been dead for ten years. Then the boy wistfully asks his
mother, "Do you think that Daddy can actually be with me
here on these Korean battlefields?" The answer is, "Why
not?" How can we be citizens of a scientific generation and
not believe that this could be true? Again and again proofs
are offered that this is a dynamic universe, surcharged with
mystic, electric, electronic, atomic forces, and all are so
wonderful that we have never yet comprehended them. This
universe is a great spiritual sounding house, alive and vital.
Albert E. Cliff, well-known Canadian writer, tells of the
death of his father. The dying man had sunk into a coma and
it was thought he was gone. Then a momentary resurgence of
life occurred. His eyes flickered open. On the wall was one
of those old-time mottoes which said, "I Know That My
Redeemer Liveth." The dying man opened his eyes, looked
at that motto, and said, "I do know that my Redeemer liveth.
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for they are all here around me — mother, father, brothers,
and sisters." Long gone from this earth were they all, but
evidently he saw them. Who is to gainsay?
The late Mrs. Thomas A. Edison told me that when her
famous husband was dying he whispered to his physician, "It
is beautiful over there." Edison was the world's greatest
scientist. All his life he had worked with phenomena. He was
of a factual cast of mind. He never reported anything as a
fact until he saw it work. He would never have reported, "It
is very beautiful over there" unless, having seen, he knew it
to be true.
Many years ago a missionary went to the South Sea Islands
to work among a cannibal tribe. After many months he
converted the chief to Christianity. One day this old chief
said to the missionary, "Remember the time you first came
among us?"
"Indeed I do," replied the missionary. "As I went through the
forest I became aware of hostile forces all around me."
"They did indeed surround you," said the chief, "for we were
following you to kill you, but something prevented us from
doing it."
"And what was that?" asked the missionary.
"Now that we are friends, tell me," coaxed the chief, "who
were those two shining ones walking on either side of you?"
My friend, Geoffrey O'Hara, famous song writer, author of
the popular World War I song, "Katy," also "There Is No
Death," "Give a Man a Horse He Can Ride," and other songs,
tells of a colonel in World War I whose regiment was wiped
out in a bloody engagement. As he paced up and down the
trench he says he could feel their hands and sense their
presence. He said to Geoffrey O'Hara, "I tell you, there is no
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death." Mr. O'Hara wrote one of his greatest songs using that
title, "there is no death."
Of these deep and tender matters I personally have no doubt
whatsoever. I firmly believe in the continuation of life after
that which we call death takes place. I believe there are two
sides to the phenomenon known as death — this side where
we now live and the other side where we shall continue to
live. Eternity does not start with death. We are in eternity
now. We are citizens of eternity. We merely change the form
of the experience called life, and that change, I am
persuaded, is for the better.
My mother was a great soul, and her influence on me will
ever stand out in my life as an experience that cannot be
surpassed. She was a wonderful conversationalist. Her mind
was keen and alert. She traveled the world over and enjoyed
wide contacts as a Christian leader in missionary causes. Her
life was full and rich. She had a marvelous sense of humor.
She was good company, and I always loved to be with her.
She was considered by all who knew her an unusually
fascinating and stimulating personality.
During my adult years whenever I had the opportunity I
would go home to see her. I always anticipated the arrival at
the family home, for it was an exciting experience in which
everyone talked at once as we sat around the breakfast table.
What happy reunions — what glorious meetings. Then came
her death, and we tenderly laid her body in the beautiful little
cemetery at Lynchburg in southern Ohio, a town where she
had lived as a girl. I was very sad the day we left her there,
and went away heavy-hearted. It was in the fullness of
summertime when we took her home to her last resting
place.
It came autumn, and I felt that I wanted to be with my
mother again. I was lonely without her, therefore I decided to
go to Lynchburg. All night long on the train I thought sadly
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of the happy days now gone and how things were utterly
changed and would never be the same again.
So I came to the little town. The weather was cold and the
sky overcast as I walked to the cemetery. I pushed through
the old iron gates and my feet rustled in the leaves as I
walked to her grave where I sat sad and lonely. Of a sudden
the clouds parted and the sun came through. It lighted up the
Ohio hills in gorgeous autumn colors, the hills where I grew
up as a boy, which I have always loved so well, where she
herself had played as a girl in the long ago.
Then all of a sudden I seemed to hear her voice. Now I didn't
actually hear her voice, but I seemed to. I am sure I heard it
by the inward ear. The message was clear and distinct. It was
stated in her beloved old-time tone, and this is what she said,
"Why seek ye the living among the dead? I am not here. Do
you think that I would stay in this dark and dismal place? I
am with you and my loved ones always." In a burst of inner
light I became wondrously happy. I knew that what I had
heard was the truth. The message came to me with all the
force of actuality. I could have shouted, and I stood up and
put my hand on the tombstone and saw it for what it is, only
a place where mortal remains lay. The body was there, to be
sure, but it was only a coat that had been laid off because the
wearer needed it no longer. But she, that gloriously lovely
spirit, she was not there.
I walked out of that place and only rarely since have I
returned. I like to go back there and think of her and the old
days of my youth, but no longer is it a place of gloom. It is
merely a symbol, for she is not there. She is with us her
loved ones. "Why seek ye the living among the dead?" (Luke
24 : 5 )
Read and believe the Bible as it tells about the goodness of
God and the immortality of the soul. Pray sincerely and with
faith. Make prayer and faith the habit of your life. Learn to
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have real fellowship with God and with Jesus Christ. As you
do this you will find a deep conviction welling up in your
mind that these wonderful things are true indeed.
"...if it were not so, I would have told you." (John 14:2) You
can depend upon the reliability of Christ. He would not let
you believe and hold convictions so sacred in nature unless
they are absolutely true.
So in this faith, which is a sound, substantial, and rational
view of life and eternity, you have the prescription for
heartache.
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