But though we have not had the cholera among us, has God therefore not visited us?  That would surely be evil news for us, according to Holy Scripture.  For if God do not visit us, then He must be far from us.  But the Psalmist cries, ‘Go not far from me, O Lord.’  His fear is, again and again, not that God should visit him, but that God should desert him.  And more, the word which is translated ’to visit,’ in Scripture has the sense of seeing to a man, overseeing him, being his bishop.  If God do not see to, oversee us, and be our bishop, then He must turn His face from us, which is what the Psalmist beseeches Him again and again not to do; praying, ’Hide not Thy face from me, O Lord,’ and crying out of the depths of anxiety and trouble, ’Put thy trust in God, for I shall yet give Him thanks for the light of His countenance;’ and again, ’In Thy presence is’—­ not death, but—­’life; at Thy right hand is fulness of days for evermore.’  And again, the Psalmist prays to God to visit him, and visit his thoughts,—­’Search me, O Lord, and try the ground of my heart.  Search me, and examine my thoughts.  Look well if there be any wickedness in me, and lead me in the way everlasting.’  Shall we pray that prayer, my friends?  Shall we, with the Psalmist, pray God to visit, and, if need be, chasten and correct what He sees wrong in us?  Or shall we, with the superstitious, pray to God not to visit us? to keep away from us? to leave its alone? to forget us?  If He did answer that foolish prayer, there would be an end of us and all created things; for in God they live and move and have their being—­ as it is written, ’When Thou hidest thy face, they are troubled; when Thou takest away their breath, they die, and are turned again to their dust.’  But, happily for us, God will not answer that foolish prayer.  For it is written, ’If I go up to heaven, Thou art there; if I go down to hell, Thou art there also.’  Nowhither can we go from God’s presence:  nowhither can we flee from His Spirit.

This is the Scripture language.  Is ours like it?  Have we not got to think of a visitation of God as a simple calamity?  If a man die suddenly and strangely, he has died by the visitation of God.  But if he be saved from death strangely and suddenly, it does not occur to us to call that a visitation, and to say with Scripture, ’The Lord has visited the man with His salvation.’  If the cholera comes, or the crops fail, we say,—­God is visiting us.  If we have an especially healthy year, or a glorious harvest, we never say with Scripture, ‘The Lord has visited His people in giving them bread.’  Yet Scripture, if it says, ‘I will visit their transgressions,’ says also that the Lord visited the children of Israel to deliver them out of Egypt.  If it talks of death as the visitation of all men, it speaks of God visiting Sarah and Hannah to give them children.  If it says, ‘I will visit the blood shed in Jezreel,’ it says also, ’Thy visitation hath preserved my spirit.’  If it says, ’At the time they are visited they shall be cast down,’ it says also, ’The Lord shall visit them, and turn away their captivity.’