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The Ministry of Consolation
No: 1
A word in season (Isa. 50:4)
One of the most enviable gifts that we can possess when seeking to minister to those in
distress or sorrow is the ability to speak a word "in season" to him that is weary. There
are many weary hearts that cry out for comfort, yet how many are rebuffed and chilled
simply because the word of comfort has not been spoken "in season". The word in season
cannot be learned by rote, neither can it be acquired by an artificial means. Words that
reach the heart must come from the heart.
In Isaiah 50:4 we may learn the precious secret.
1. The Tongue
"The Lord God hath give me the tongue of the learner, that I should know how to
speak a word in season to him that is weary"
The gift of tongues surely never included a more precious gift than this. It is most
important for us to observed that the word rendered "learned" in the A.V. should be
"learner". Of all the people most unfit to speak to sorrowing ones is the "learned" on as
such. Isaiah uses the word so rendered, four times. "Disciples" (8:16); "Taught of"
(54:13); and "learned" (50:4 twice).
The learner, the one who has passed through the school of experience, is alone fitted
to minister comfort to the weary. How is the tongue of the learner obtained?
2. The Ear
"He wakeneth morning by morning, He wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learner" (Isa. 50:4)
Here is the blessed secret. The tongue is influenced by the ear. This is so in the
physical world. There are many who are dumb solely because they are deaf. They do not
know that they can make an articulate sound, therefore they never speak. It is the same in
the spiritual world. Many a believer is dumb in testimony, in prayer, in proclamation,
because he is deaf. To have the tongue of the learner we need the wakened ear. The
wakened ear means more than merely "hearing", for "to hearken" in the Scriptures
includes obedience. So, in Isaiah 50:5, the opened ear is associated with meek subjection: