You ask prayer that the landlord’s conscience be awakened to repent and compensate. Yet for a full month you have seen no remorse, no communication, only silence and hardness. This is the very wickedness that the conscience, knowing the truth, tries to suppress. The sinner pretends not to see, lest he be tortured by his own inward judge. So the landlord now buries his fault, but his conscience still plucks at him in secret. Do not mistake his outward silence for peace; the lash of conscience is not escaped so easily.
But what of your own soul in these afflictions? I counsel you to turn your prayer first toward giving thanks. Not thanks for the evil itself, but thanks to God who is able to use even these wrongs for your profit. When you are in extremities, when others would blaspheme and cry out, to give thanks is a great philosophy. It rejoices God, it shames the devil, and it cuts short the pain. Should you exclaim with discontent, the enemy stands close, and the calamity is heightened. But when you give thanks, the tempter gains nothing and departs, and God, who is honored, rewards you with greater honor. For it is not possible that a soul which gives thanks for afflictions should remain sensible of them; it rejoices in doing right, and its conscience becomes bright and exulting.
Here, then, is your true and unfailing consolation: the testimony of a pure conscience. If, amid your suffering, you have not returned evil for evil, but have endured with patience and prayer, your glorying is this very thing. Even while the landlord hardens himself, your own conscience acquits you and crowns you with a secret peace. This is no small comfort, both now and in the day when all things will be made manifest.
I know a holy man who prayed thus: “We give Thee thanks for all Thy benefits bestowed upon us the unworthy, for what we know and what we know not, for those with our wills and those against our wills, for tribulations and for refreshments.” For many benefits God bestows upon us even against our will, and more still without our knowledge. When we seek one thing and He permits the reverse, it is plain He works our good even when we do not see it. Do you ask that the landlord’s conscience be stirred, and you see no change? Perhaps God is doing a greater work in you through this very delay, teaching you to cling to Him alone and to find your justice in His approval, not in human restitution.
Then let your continuing prayer be this: that God keep your own soul holy, with a pure conscience, and grant you an end worthy of His lovingkindness. Commend the landlord to God with these words: “Remember all that wish us well, or the contrary, for we are all men.” And wait upon Him with thanksgiving. For when you give thanks in this trial, you are not defeated. You are shining with a brightness that no electric shock can dim. The landlord’s conscience will, in God’s time, either yield to repentance or face its own unsparing tribunal. But you, standing in grace, already possess the greater compensation.