GLASGOW, 28th Oct. 1864.
MY DEAR JANE,
—Perhaps you and Horace will excuse me for not writing sooner. It requires something to raise me before I can at present take up the pen. The bewilderment is passing away—all appears too real now, but the loneliness, when will that pass away? I know 'He doth not willingly afflict,' —I have felt that—for, though the Lord saw that He must send the stroke, He has not failed, when it was over, to relieve the wound by many means. I am sure many have prayed for me. I have got many most helpful letters of sympathy, all which are sufficient to assure me that the Elder Brother's heart feels for me in infinite love.
Tell Horace I have tried to glean something in his fields, The Night of Weeping-. But oh! Jane, when I look back on the sixteen years of happy, happy home-life, and when I take up some letter or paper or anything else that recalls past days of peace and most helpful affection, all I can say is, that the Lord who so filled my cup, and then in a moment dashed it to the ground, must be dealing in fatherly love, and must be doing even this in the depths of His compassion for me. 'It is the Lord.'
Let us live with all our might for the Lord. My dear Isabella could not bid me farewell—was it meant as if to intimate 'no need of farewell, the time of separation is so short.' Do not forget my motherless children. How she cared for them! I never knew one who was more led to tell the Lord all little cares and difficulties, and more habitually made conscience of little things in the family. Mrs. Grant and her daughter have been most useful and kind to us. . . .
We are looking forward to the baptism [of the motherless baby] on Sabbath eight days.
—Your affectionate brother,
ANDREW A. BONAR
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GLASGOW, 22nd June 1870.
MY DEAR JANE,
—I can quite sympathise with your sadness when the flowers in the garden recall Kitty and her cheerful, happy ways. The very beauty and bloom help to deepen the melancholy feeling which weighs down the soul as you remember the absent one whose presence was sunshine, and for whom the garden seemed to blossom. But it is written, 'Our light afflictions, which are but for a moment, work out for us—glory, while we look not at the things that are seen, but at the things which are unseen.' May I not adopt the language of John, and say, 'I heard a voice from heaven saying, there is present rest for the aching heart in beholding the Lamb slain, and holding fellowship with Him.'. . .
Kindest love to all.
—Your affectionate brother,
ANDREW A. BONAR.
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Andrew Bonar (1810 - 1892)
He was a well-known pastor in Scotland with the Free Church. His brother Horatius was another well-known minister who was contemporary with Robert Murray Mchyene and others in those days. They saw a move of revival in their churches where the Spirit brought many immediate conversations in a short period of time.He is best known for his work on compiling the life of the prophet of Dundee: Robert Murray Mchyene: "Memoir and Remains of Robert Murray McCheyne." One cannot read this volume and feel the sobriety of eternity and the fear of the Lord. He also wrote a wonderful volume on Leviticus.
Andrew Alexander Bonar was a minister of the Free Church of Scotland, and the youngest brother of Horatius Bonar.
He studied at Edinburgh; was minister at Collace, Perthshire, 1838 - 1856 (both in the Church of Scotland and the Free Church); and of Finnieston Free Church, Glasgow, 1856 till his death.
He was identified with evangelical and revival movements and adhered to the doctrine of premillennialism. With Robert Murray McCheyne he visited Palestine in 1839 to inquire into the condition of the Jews there. During the visit of Dwight L. Moody to Britain in 1874 and 1875, Moody was warmly welcomed by Bonar, despite the latter receiving considerable criticism from other Calvinist ministers in the Free Church.
Andrew Bonar preached from the whole Bible, the Word of God from Genesis to Revelation. When one of his friends remarked on his originality in finding subjects for preaching, and wondered where he got all his texts, he just lifted up his Bible. He did not ignore any part of it, but explained it all. He did not shy away from any passages that might be seen as unpopular or unpleasant. Even the first chapters of Chronicles became 'God calling the roll of mankind.' He made it come alive as a history of men and women, living in their time, as we live in ours, accountable to God.
Christ and Him crucified was at the centre of all his preaching, in all parts of the Bible. He declared 'the whole counsel of God', and was deeply aware of his responsibility as a man of God. He spent hours every day in prayer and meditation of the Scriptures, and asking for the Holy Spirit to show the truth to him, so that he might pass it on to his flock. He wrote in a letter: "Persevering prayerfulness is harder for the flesh than preaching."
Above all, he was aware that his personal holiness would be of crucial importance to his preaching, as his remark shows: "Sins of teachers are teachers of sins."