THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 LOS ANGELES
 
 THE NIGHT OF WEEPING; 
 
 WORDS FOR THE SUFFERING FAMILY OF GOD 
 
 " Weeping may endure for a night, but joy cometh in the 
 morning." PSA. xxx. 5. 
 
 "We must through much,, tribulation enter into the king- 
 dom of God." ACTS xiv. 23. 
 
 BY THE 
 
 REV. HORATIUS BONAR. 
 
 FROM THE THIRD LONDON EDITION. 
 
 NEW YORK: 
 
 ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS, 
 
 No. 285 BROADWAY. 
 
 1852.
 
 
 
 PREFACE. 
 
 Iv to MI arr matter to write a book for the family of God. 
 Yet it v 3U tVi that these thoughts on chastisement are 
 written. 
 
 They may be found not unsuitable for the younger brethren 
 of the man of sorrows. For the way is rough, and the desert- 
 blast is keen. Who of them can say aught regarding their 
 prospects here, save that tribulation awaiteth them in every 
 place as they pass along. This they must know and prepare 
 for, grasping more firmly at every step the gracious hand that 
 is leading them on to the kingdom, and looking up for gui- 
 dance to the loving eye that rests over them with fondest 
 vigilance, ever bright and ever iender, whether in shadow or 
 in sunshine, whether amid the crowds of busy life, or in the 
 solitude of the lonely way. 
 
 It is, then, to the members of this family that this little 
 volume is offered. They may find in it something which 
 may not merely interest them; but may also meet their case; 
 something too in which, perhaps, they may recognise not the 
 voice of a stranger, but of a brother ; "a companion in tribu- 
 lation and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ."* 
 For the tones of the suffering brotherhood on earth have 
 something in them too peculiar not to be instinctively recog- 
 ni/.cil. It is said of Arabian airs that they are all plaintive. 
 They all touch some melancholy chord, as if the wail of the 
 desert-echo were the key-note of each melody. It is in some 
 measure thus with the children of the kingdom, while so- 
 journers in this wilderness of earth. " Their voice is ever 
 soft, gentle, and low." Sorrow has smoothed away its harsh- 
 ness, and breathed gentler feeling into its tones. True, it is 
 the voice of gladness, for it is the voice of the forgiven; but 
 still it is sorrowing gladness, calm and serious joy. Thoir 
 peculiar lot as followers of a hated Lord, and their peculiar 
 circumstances, as standing in the midst of a doomed and dy- 
 
 * Rev i. 9
 
 IV PREFACE. 
 
 ing world, have wrought into their spirit a deep, though se- 
 rene, solemnity of expression, alike in look and voice. Hence, 
 the instinctive recognition among the brotherhood, not only 
 of the family look, but of the family tones. 
 
 It is of family concerns that we speak, and in these each 
 member has a common interest. The " household of faith" 
 has many concerns, and not the least of these are its sorrows. 
 These are the lot of all; and there is no member of the house- 
 hold but has his share in these, either in personal suffering 
 or in helping to bear the burden of others. 
 
 What is now written may be found suitable to all, whether 
 actually under chastisement or not. It is. however, pre- 
 sented specially to those who are " in heaviness through 
 manifold temptations," suffering the rebuke of the Lord, pass- 
 ing through fire and through water, with "affliction laid 
 upon their loins."* The bruised reed must not be broken , 
 the smoking flax must not be quenched. The hands which 
 hang down must be lifted up, and the feeble knees confirmed ; 
 that which is lame must not be turned out of the way, but 
 rather healed.t 
 
 Our desire is to minister to the saints in the consolation 
 and admonition of the Lord. We would seek to bear their 
 burdens, to bind up their wounds, and to dry up at least some 
 out of their many tears. To comfort those that mourn is not 
 only to act in obedience to the command, "bear ye one anoth- 
 er's burdens, and so fulfil the law of Christ ;" it is to walk 
 by the side of Jesus in his visits of mercy to his suffering 
 saints on earth; nay, it is to be fellow-workers with the Holy 
 Ghost as the Church's Comforter in all her tribulations and 
 distresses. 
 
 Of these things the world knows little. Its sympathies are 
 not with the saints, either in their sorrow or their joy. Fam- 
 ily concerns, and especially family griefs, are not for strangers 
 to intermeddle with. They are things too high for them. 
 And how shall they understand them so long as they remain 
 without 1 They must first come in, and take their place 
 among the children, beneath the paternal roof. And what 
 should stay them! The gate stands open day and night. 
 They would be welcomed in with the kindliest greetings of 
 love. 
 
 But though standing afar off from the saints, and unable to 
 mingle its sympathies with theirs, still the world has sorrows 
 of its own, deep and many. To grieve, and yet have no 
 comforter ; to be wounded, and yet have no healer ; to be 
 
 ' Psa. bcvi. 11, 12. t Heb. xii. 12
 
 PREFACE. y 
 
 weary, and yet know no resting-place; this is tie world's 
 hard lot. 
 
 Yet it is a self-chosen one. God did not choose it for 
 them. They chose it for themselves. God invites, nay, 
 pleads hard with them to quit it, yet they will not. Wretched 
 as it is, they yet prefer it to the friendship of him, with whom 
 their heart is at enmity, and whose presence is to them all 
 
 loom and terror. Yet he continues to entreat them. He 
 oes not let them alone. The " many sorrows" which com- 
 pass them about are his many messages of grace, his un- 
 wearied knockings at their fast-closed door. He writes " van- 
 ity" upon the creature, " weariness and vexation" upon 
 earth's best delights, that men may not place their confidence 
 in these. Most mercifully does he hedge them about with 
 disappointment of every form, that they may lift their eyes 
 above this earth, and beyond these heavens, to the enduring 
 blessedness that is at his right hand for ever. With what 
 kindness, though with seeming severity, does he mar their 
 best friendships, that he may attract them to the communion 
 of his own far better and everlasting companionship 1 With 
 what compassion does he break in upon their misguided at- 
 tachments, that he may draw them away from earth, and bind 
 them to himself by the more blessed ties of his own far sweeter 
 love 1 With what tenderness does he tear asunder the bonds 
 of brotherhood and kindred, that he may unite them to him- 
 self in far dearer and eternal relationship ? W T ith what 
 mercy does he overthrow their prospects of worldly wealth, 
 and bring down their hopes of earthly power and greatness, 
 that he may give them the heavenly treasure, and make them 
 a " royal priesthood" to himself in the glorious kingdom of 
 his Son. With what love does he ruin their reputation 
 among men, breaking in pieces their good name which was 
 their idol, that he may show them the vanity of human 
 praise, leading them to desire the honor that cometh from 
 God, to know that in his favor is life, and that the light of 
 his countenance is the very sunshine of heaven. 
 
 Oh, that a weary, broken-hearted world would learn these 
 lessons of grace ! Oh, that they would taste and see that God 
 is good. Let them but come home to him. He will not 
 mock them with shadows, nor feed them upon husks. He 
 will satisfy their craving souls ; he will turn their midnight 
 into noon ; he will give them beauty for ashes, the oil of joy 
 for mourning, the garment of praise for the spirit of heavi- 
 ness, that they may be called trees of righteousness, the 
 planting of the Lord.
 
 VI PREFACE. 
 
 Let the world, however, regard God's dealings with them 
 as they may : let not " the children" despise the chastening 
 of the Lord, nor faint when they are rebuked of him. They 
 at least should know the meaning of his actings towards 
 them, for they know HIMSELF. The world may misunder 
 stand his rebukes, or put an unkind construction upon them; 
 they cannot, for they know that " God is love." 
 
 The thoughts that follow are designed to assist them in in- 
 terpreting God's ways ; not merely in finding comfort under 
 trial, but in drawing profit from it. I have at least attempted 
 to contribute something towards this end. I have done what 
 I could, rather than what I would. But it may be that the 
 Head of the family will own it, and send it with his own 
 blessing to the scattered members near and far. He knows 
 that they need some such words in season ; and that, if 
 thickening signs deceive not, they will ere long need them 
 more. In such a case even this little volume may be helpful. 
 
 It is written in much weakness, and with many sins to 
 mar it : amid what trials it is of little moment for a stranger 
 to learn. It is written by one who is seeding himself to 
 profit by trial, and trembles lest it should pass by as the wind 
 over the rock, leaving it as hard as ever; by one who would 
 fain in every sorrow draw near to God, that he may know 
 Him more, and who is not unwilling to confess that as yet 
 lie knows but little. 
 
 fclto, Dec. 19, 1843.
 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 PAOB 
 
 The Family .... .9 
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 The Family Life ... .23 
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 The Family Badge ... .33 
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 The Family Discipline . . . . .44 
 
 CHAPTER V. 
 The Family Rods .... 65 
 
 CHAPTER VL 
 The Types .... . . 79 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 The Proving .... .86 
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 The Rebuking . . . . . .97
 
 V1U CONTENTS. 
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 PAOB 
 
 The Purifying . . . . .107 
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 Ths Arousing . . . .119 
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 The Solemnizing . . . .129 
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 The Warning . . . . .139 
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 The Recollections . 154 
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 The Consolation . . . .162 
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 The Eternal Results . . . .175
 
 CHAPTER I. 
 
 THE FAMILY. 
 
 IT was God's purpose from the beginning, 
 not merely to redeem for Himself a people out 
 of a world of sinners, but to bring that people 
 into a peculiar relationship to Himself. It 
 was his purpose to draw them nearer to Him- 
 self than any other order of his creatures, and 
 to establish a link between them and Godhead 
 of the closest and most peculiar kind. 
 
 To carry out this purpose, was the WORD 
 made flesh. " He took not on him the nature 
 of angels, but he took on him the seed of Abra- 
 ham."* "Forasmuch as the children were 
 partakers of flesh and blood, he himself like- 
 wise took part of the same."t 
 
 Thus a new relationship was established, 
 such as till then, could never have been con- 
 ceived of, as even possible. The tie of creation, 
 though not dissolved, was now to be lost in the 
 closer, dearer tie of kindred. " Both He who 
 sanctifieth, and they who are sanctified, are all 
 
 * Heb. ii. 16. t Heb. ii. 14.
 
 10 "'"W p.\l"TTV. 
 
 of one ; for which cause he is not ashamed to 
 call them brethren."* He calls them breth- 
 ren, and they call him brother. Being " made 
 of a woman," he has become partaker of our 
 lowly humanity, so as to be bone of our bone, 
 and flesh of our flesh ; and we being " born of 
 God," are made partakers of the Divine nature, 
 becoming " members of his body, of his flesh and 
 of his bones. 5 ' Thus the saints are the nearest 
 kinsmen of the Son of God ; and if of the Son, 
 then of the Father also, as he hath said, " I 
 and my Father are one :" " believest thou not 
 that I am in the Father, and the Father in me." 
 It is thus that the family relationship is 
 formed, and God's original design carried out. 
 For thus it is written, " As many as received 
 him, to them gave he power, (or the right) to 
 become the sons of God, even to them that be- 
 lieve on his name : which were born not of 
 blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the 
 will of man, but of God."t And again, " Be- 
 hold what manner of love the Father hath be- 
 stowed upon us, that we should be called the 
 sons of God."f We are elevated to creation's 
 highest level. We are brought into the inner 
 circle of the Father's love, nearer his throne, 
 * Heb. ii. II t John i. 12, 13. t 1 John iii. 1.
 
 THE FAMILY. 11 
 
 nearer his heart than angels, for we are the body 
 of Christ, and members in particular, "the 
 fulness of him that filleth all in all." 
 
 Out of this new link there springs the family 
 bond between us and the God and Father of 
 our Lord Jesus Christ; "his Father and our 
 Father, his God and our God." And it is espe- 
 cially in this name of family that God delights. 
 He has many names for his redeemed. They 
 are his chosen ones, Ais people, his flock, his 
 heritage. But it is, as his family, that he 
 speaks of them oftenest, and it is, as such, that 
 that he bends over them so fondly, as over his 
 first-born, the children of his heart, and the 
 desire of his eyes. 
 
 But it is needful that we inquire farther con- 
 cerning this family, and learn from God's own 
 account of them, who and what they are. By 
 nature they are children of wrath, even as 
 others. And thus far, there is no original dif- 
 ference between them and the world. But 
 they are the eternally chosen of the Father, 
 " Chosen in Christ before the foundation of the 
 world."* This is their true ancestry, and this is 
 their chiefest glory. " They are predestinated to 
 the adoption of children by Jesus Christ to him- 
 * Eph. i. 4.
 
 12 THE FAMILY. 
 
 self, according to the good pleasure of his will."* 
 They are quickened together with Christ, from 
 being dead in trespasses and sins, and raised 
 up by the exceeding greatness of God's power, 
 the same mighty power by which he wrought 
 in Christ when he raised him from the dead.t 
 They are saved by grace through faith, and 
 that not of themselves, it is the gift of God.J 
 They are reconciled to God by the death of his 
 Son. They are delivered from a present evil 
 world according to the will of God their Father. II 
 They are washed in the blood of Jesus, and 
 justified by faith in his name. They are re- 
 deemed from their vain conversation, not with 
 corruptible things, as silver and gold, but with 
 the precious blood of Christ, as of a lamb with- 
 out blemish and without spot : who verily was 
 fore-ordained before the foundation of the world, 
 but was manifest in these last times for them. TT 
 They are made heirs of God, and joint heirs 
 with Jesus Christ ; kings and priests unto God, 
 who are to reign with Christ for ever over 
 a redeemed and restored creation. Such is the 
 family. Surely they are high-born. Their 
 ancestry is from eternity. Their descent is 
 
 * Eph. i. 5. t Eph. i. 19. t Eph. ii. 8. 
 
 Rom. v. 10. II Gal. i. 4. IT 1 Pet. i. 9.
 
 THE FAMILY. 13 
 
 from the King of kings. They are of the 
 blood royal of heaven. And though their 
 present condition be a lowly one, their prospects 
 are the brightest that hope ever painted ; bright- 
 er than what eye hath seen, or ear hath heard. 
 It doth not yet appear what they shall be ; but 
 they know that when he shall appear, they 
 shall be like him, for they shall see him as he is* 
 But apart from these descriptions which 
 encircle the saved family with such peculiar 
 glory even here, their simple condition of being 
 God's family calls for a little farther notice. 
 For it is not outward circumstances that form, 
 or give interest to, a home or a family ; it is the 
 living pulse of affection that is beating there. 
 Neither earthly pomp, nor earthly poverty, can 
 materially alter the real inward character of 
 that little circle of human hearts which man 
 calls a family. Bright skies and sunshine can- 
 not weaken or sever the bond ; neither can they 
 allure them away from rejoicing in each other's 
 joy and love. Dark days ind tempests cannot 
 sunder them ; they do but make them gather 
 more closely together, as being all in all to each 
 other then. So with the family of the redeemed, 
 It is not their outward circumstances or pros* 
 
 * 1 John iii. & 
 2
 
 14 THE FAMILY. 
 
 pects that give them the name ; it is something 
 far tenderer and deeper than these. It is the 
 pulse of heavenly affection, throbbing through 
 every member, and coming down from the in- 
 finite neart above ; it is this that makes them 
 what they are. It is under this aspect that 
 God delights to look upon them. It is for this 
 reason, especially, that he has given to them 
 the name they bear. 
 
 The word family is a sacred one, even 
 among the children of the world. There is a 
 hallowed tenderness about it, which few, save 
 the wickedest, do not in some measure feeL 
 One of their own poets has thus expressed the 
 feeling : 
 
 Beneath the foulest mother's curse 
 
 No living thing can thrive ; 
 A mother is a mother still, 
 
 The holiest thing alive. 
 
 I by no means accord with the sentiment 
 contained in these words ; the language is too 
 strong. Still it shows the world's feeling as to 
 the strength and sacredness of the family bond. 
 And there is much of truth contained, or at 
 least implied in it. No other earthly circle can 
 be compared with that of the family. It com- 
 prises all that a human heart most values and 
 delights in. It is the centre where all human
 
 THE FAMILY. 15 
 
 affections meet and entwine, the vessel into 
 which they all pour themselves with such joy- 
 ous freedom. There is no one word which 
 contains in it so many endearing associations 
 and precious remembrances, hid in the heart 
 like gold. It appeals at once to the very centre 
 of man's being, his " heart of hearts." All 
 that is sweet, soothing, tender, and true, is 
 wrapt up in that one name. It speaks not of 
 one circle or one bond ; but of many circles and 
 many bonds, all of them near the heart. 
 The family home, the family hearth, the family 
 table, family habits, family voices, family to- 
 kens, family salutations, family melodies, 
 family joys and sorrows ; what a mine of re- 
 collections lies under that one word ! Take 
 these away, and earth becomes a mere church- 
 yard of crumbling bones ; and man as so many 
 grains of loosened sand, or at best, but as the 
 fragments of a torn flower, which the winds 
 are scattering abroad. 
 
 All that is beautiful in human relationship, 
 or tender in human affection, or gentle in hu- 
 man intercourse; all that is loveable and 
 precious in the movements of a human heart 
 from its lowest depth to its uppermost surface, 
 all these are wrapt up in the one name of
 
 16 THE FAMILY. 
 
 family. For close-knit bonds, for stedfasl 
 faithfulness in love, for depth of sympathy, for 
 endurance in trial and danger where shall we 
 find any thing that can be compared to the 
 story of earth's family circles ? Conjugal love, 
 parental love, filial love, brotherly love, sisterly 
 love, all are here. The many streams of 
 human affection empty themselves into it, or 
 flow out of it for the fertility and gladness of 
 the earth. 
 
 We need not wonder, then, that this name 
 should be chosen as one of the Church's pecu- 
 liar names. God delights in it as the name by 
 which his company of chosen ones is to be 
 specially called. THE FAMILY OF GOD that 
 is the Church's name. As such he dwells in 
 the midst of it, cares for it, and watches over 
 it. His dealings with it are those of a father 
 fond yet strict loving yet wise sitting 
 amongst his children, having his eye on each, 
 and ordering in his gracious wisdom all the 
 concerns of his household. 
 
 His heart is there ! Yes, it is in his church 
 that God's heart may be said specially to be. 
 There it unfolds itself in a way, such as it can 
 do amid no other order of his creatures. There 
 it shows itself in all its manifold fulness, such
 
 THE FAMILY. 17 
 
 as it has no scope for elsewhere. It is in the 
 family alone that the one thing we call affec- 
 tion or love, is divided and spread out, like a 
 sunbeam into the rainbow's seven-fold hues, 
 there to display itself in all the rich tints of 
 hidden beauty. So it is in the Church alone, 
 that the love of God is fully seen, not merely 
 in all its intensity, but in all its varied riches. 
 All kinds of love are unfolded there. There is 
 room for such wide variety of affection, both 
 between the Head and the members, and be- 
 tween the members one with the other, that it 
 seems as if there had been given new powers 
 of loving, as well as new objects to love. 
 
 No doubt there are other names for the 
 saints besides this one. But none of them ex- 
 presses what this is intended to do. God calls 
 them his flock, which implies tender watchful- 
 ness on his part and dependent helplessness on 
 theirs. He calls them a vine, denoting their 
 oneness, as well as the unceasing nourishment 
 that is ever circulating through them from the 
 parent stern. He calls them a temple, signi- 
 fying their compactness of structuie, symmetry 
 of design, beauty of form, and above all, fitness 
 for the inhabitation and worship of Jehovah. 
 He calls them a body, to set forth, not merely 
 2*
 
 18 THE FAMILY. 
 
 their comely proportions, but their marvellous 
 unity and conscious vitality of being, as well 
 as the closeness of the binding tie, and their 
 various serviceableness to each other. He 
 calls them a city, intimating their happy com- 
 munity of privileges and rights and well or- 
 dered government; the security, peace, abun- 
 dance which they enjoy ; the comforts of 
 neighborhood with all its cheerful greetings 
 and mutual offices of love. He calls them a 
 kingdom, as expressive of their high and 
 honorable estate, of the royalty, the glory, the 
 dominion, of which they have been made the 
 heirs. 
 
 But various and expressive as are these 
 well-known names, they are still imperfect. 
 They describe as it were only the outer circles, 
 each name a circle of its own. But the inner 
 circle the inner region of our spiritual being 
 they do not touch upon. It is that well-known 
 word, that magic name, a. family, which alone 
 ^ can express all that God sees of what is comely 
 and tender, loving and loveable in the Church 
 of Christ, into which he is pouring his love, 
 through which he delights to see that love 
 circulate unhindered, and out of which he ex- 
 pects tha t love to flow abroad.
 
 THE FAMILY. 19 
 
 There is one thing that strikes us much 
 concerning this family. It is the way in which 
 Christ speaks of the special interest which he 
 takes in each member. "Those that thou 
 gavest me I have kept, and none of them is 
 lost."* How like the family feeling ! Each 
 name, each face is known ; known so fami- 
 liarly that the least and youngest would at 
 once be missed. The place where each sits, 
 the room which each occupies, the time of 
 their going out and coming in ; their looks, 
 their habits, their tones, are so thoroughly 
 known, that the moment any one is absent he 
 is missed. And then no other can supply his 
 place. His absence makes a blank which 
 none but himself can fill. An acquaintance or 
 fellow-townsman may drop away and never be 
 missed. His place is easily filled up by another. 
 Not so with a member of the family. A break 
 there is a dismal blank : and when death has 
 carried off a brother, a sister, or a parent, who, 
 or what, can ever fill their room ? When one 
 flower fades, another springs up, fresher per- 
 haps and more fragrant and we forget the 
 faded one. But the withered family flower 
 can have no successor : it dies, and there is a 
 * John xvii. 12.
 
 20 THE FAMILY. 
 
 blank for ever. Might it not be with some 
 such feeling that Jesus looked round upon his 
 vast household circle, and, while surveying 
 each well-known face, gave thanks that not 
 one was lost : as if he could not have spared 
 so much as one of those whom the Father had 
 given him. 
 
 Oh, the deep interest which Jesus takes in 
 each ! Truly it is a personal and peculiar at- 
 tachment to each member. Do we not lose 
 much by forgetting this? Even in human 
 things we are apt to overlook this. We call 
 the feeling which the Father entertains to 
 each of his children, love ; and well we call it 
 so ; but this is not all. There is a difference 
 in the love he bears to his eldest and his 
 youngest born ; a difference in the case of 
 each, called forth by the peculiar character of 
 each. It is this minute and special love which 
 is so precious. Were it not for this, we should 
 feel as if we had only part of our Father's 
 heart, as if we had not all that of right belongs 
 to us. But, realizing this, we feel as if we had 
 his whole heart, and yet our having die whole 
 did not rob our brothers and sisters of any. It 
 is with a family as with the sun in the firma- 
 ment. It is the property of all, and yet each
 
 THE FAMILY. 21 
 
 has the whole of it. Even so with Jehovah 
 our heavenly Father; even so with Jesus our 
 elder brother. His is a special, personal, pe- 
 culiar love, just as if he loved no other, but had 
 his whole heart to spare for us. His is a 
 minute and watchful care, bending over each, 
 day and night, as if he had no other to care 
 for. How sweet to think that each of us is the 
 special object of such personal attachment, the 
 peculiar object of such unwearied vigilance ! 
 What manner of love is this ! Now we believe 
 and are sure that we shall be fully cared for, 
 and not one want or sorrow overlooked. Now 
 we know that " all things shall work together 
 for our good," and that the end of everything 
 which befalls us here shall be light and glory 
 for ever ! " I know the thoughts that I think 
 towards you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace 
 and not of evil, to give you an expected end."* 
 "As one whom his mother comforteth, so will 
 I comfort you."t " Like as a father pitieth his 
 children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear 
 
 It is sweet to realize the common love flow- 
 ing out of the Father's bosom to the whole 
 happy household of his saved ones ; but it is 
 
 * Jer. xxii. 11. t Is. Ixvi. 13. * Ps. ciii. 13.
 
 22 THE FAMILY. 
 
 no less sweet, specially in the day of trial, to 
 dwell upon the personal love he bears so pecu- 
 liarly to each. It is blessed to identify our- 
 selves with such a family who are all joying 
 in the sunshine of paternal love ; but it is as 
 blessed at times to isolate oneself and realize 
 the individual love which is our own peculiar 
 heritage. Thus felt the Bride when she said, 
 " let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth, 
 for thy love is better than wine."* " I am my 
 beloved's, and my beloved is mine."t 
 
 It was when first the Holy Spirit opened our 
 ears to listen to the tale of love which the 
 Gospel brought to us, that we sought our Fa- 
 ther's house, and rested not till we had found 
 ourselves in his embrace. It was then when 
 first we received " the gift of God," and under- 
 stood the love which that gift declared, that we 
 took our place in the family circle, tasting the 
 plenty of our Father's table, and enjoying the 
 sweetness of our Father's smile. And even as 
 we entered in, so are we to abide for ever ; " root- 
 ed and grounded in love," realizing the words 
 of Jesus, " as the Father hath loved me, so have 
 I loved you : CONTINUE YE IN MY LOVE." 
 
 * Song of Solomon, i. 2. t Song of Solomon, vi. 8. 
 JJobn xv. 9.
 
 CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE FAMILY LIFE. 
 
 THEY live by faith. Thus they began, and 
 thus they are to end. " We walk by faith and 
 not by sight." Their whole life is a life of 
 faith. Their daily actings are all of faith. 
 This forms one of the main elements of their 
 character. It marks them out as a peculiar 
 people. None live as they do. 
 
 Their faith is to them "the substance of 
 things hoped for, the evidence of things not 
 seen." It is a sort of substitute for sight and 
 possession. It so brings them into contact 
 with the unseen world, that they feel as if 
 they were already conversant with, and living 
 amongst, the things unseen. It makes the 
 future, the distant, the impalpable, appear as 
 the present, the near, the real. It removes all 
 intervening time : it annihilates all interposing 
 space ; it transplants the soul at once into the 
 world above. That which we know is to 
 be hereafter, is felt as if already in being. 
 Hence the coming of the Lord is always
 
 24 THE FAMILY LIFE. 
 
 spoken of as at hand. Nay, more than this, 
 the saints are represented as " having their 
 conversation in heaven ;" as being already 
 " seated with Christ in heavenly places,"* as 
 " having come to Mount Zion, and unto the 
 city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, 
 and to an innumerable company of angels, to 
 the general assembly and church of the first- 
 born who are written in heaven, and to God 
 the judge of all, and to the spirits of just men 
 made perfect."! The things amid which they 
 are to move hereafter are so realized by faith 
 as to appear the things amid which they are 
 at present moving. They sit in "heavenly 
 places" and look down upon the earth, with 
 all its clouds and storms, as lying immeasura- 
 bly far beneath their feet. And what is a 
 "present evil world" to those who are already 
 above ah 1 its vicissitudes and breathing a purer 
 atmosphere ? 
 
 Such is the power of faith. It throws back 
 into the far distance the things of earth, the 
 things that men call near and real; and it 
 brings forward into vital contact with the soul 
 the things which men call invisible and dis- 
 tant. It discloses to us the heavenly man- 
 * Eph. ii. 6. t Heb. xii. 22.
 
 THE FAMILY LIFE. 25 
 
 aions, their passing splendor, their glorious 
 purity, their blessed peace. It shows us the 
 happy courts, the harmonious company, the 
 adoring multitudes. It opens our ears also, so 
 that when beholding these great sights we 
 seem to hear the heavenly melody, and to 
 catch the very words of the new song they 
 sing, " Thou art worthy, for thou wast slain, 
 and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out 
 of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and 
 nation, and hast made us unto our God, kings 
 and priests, and we shall reign on the earth."* 
 It moreover points our eye forward to what is 
 yet to come ; the coming of the Lord, the 
 judgment of the great day, the restitution of 
 all things, the kingdom that cannot be moved, 
 the city which hath foundations, whose builder 
 and maker is God. While thus it gives to 
 things invisible a body and a form which be- 
 fore they possessed riot in our eyes ; on the 
 other hand it divests things visible of that 
 semblance of excellence and reality with 
 which they were formerly clothed. It strips 
 the world of its false but bewildering glow, and 
 enables us to penetrate the thin disguise that 
 hides its poverty and meanness. It not only 
 * Rev, v. 9.
 
 26 THE FAMILY LIFE. 
 
 sweeps away the cloud which hung above us, 
 obstructing 1 our view of heavenly excellence ; 
 but it places that cloud beneath us, to coun- 
 teract the fallacious brightness and unreal 
 beauty which the world has thrown over itself 
 to mask its inward defo'-mity. 
 
 Thus it is that faith enables us to realize 
 our true position of pilgrims and strangers upon 
 earth, looking for the city which hath founda- 
 ions, whose builder and maker is God. It is 
 into this that we are introduced by faith at our 
 conversion. For what is our conversion, but a 
 turning our back upon the world, and bidding 
 farewell to all that the heart had hitherto been 
 entwined around 1 It is then that like Abra- 
 ham we forsake all, and go out not knowing 
 whither. Old ties are broken, though some- 
 times hard to sever. New ones are formed, 
 though not of earth. We begin to look around 
 us, and find all things new. We feel that we 
 are strangers ; strangers in that very spot where 
 we have been so long at home. But this is 
 our joy. We have left our father's house, but 
 we are hastening on to a more enduring home. 
 We have taken leave of the world, but we 
 have become heirs of the eternal kingdom, sons 
 and daughters of the Lord Almighty. We
 
 THE FAMIT..Y T1FE. 2"7 
 
 have left Egypt, but Canaan is in view. We 
 are in the wilderness, but we are free. Ours 
 is a pathless waste, but we move forward under 
 the shadow of the guardian cloud. Sorrowful, 
 we yet rejoice ; poor, we make many rich ; 
 having nothing, we yet possess all things. 
 We have a rich inheritance in reversion, and 
 a Jong eternity in which to enjoy it without 
 fear of loss, or change, or end. 
 
 Walking thus by faith, and not by sight, 
 what should move us? What should mar our 
 joy ? Does it not come from that which is 
 within the veil ; and what storm of the desert 
 can find entrance there? Our rejoicing is in 
 the Lord, and he is without variableness or 
 shadow of turning. We know that this is not 
 our rest ; neither do we wish it were so, for it 
 is polluted ; but our joy is this, that Jehovah 
 is our God, and his promised glory our inheri- 
 tance for ever. Our morning and our evening 
 song is this, " The Lord is the portion of mine 
 inheritance and of my cup ; thou maintainest 
 my lot : the lines have fallen unto me in pleas- 
 ant places ; yea, I have a goodly heritage."* 
 
 Why should we. then, into whose hands the 
 cup of gladness shall ere long be put, shrink 
 
 * Psalms xvi. 5.
 
 28 THE FAMILY LIFE. 
 
 from the vinegar ar d the gall ? Why should 
 we, who have dearer friends above, better 
 bonds that cannot be dissolved, be disconsolate 
 at the severance of an earthly tie? Our 
 homes may be empty, our firesides may be 
 thinned, and our hearts may bleed : but these 
 are not enduring things : and why should we 
 feel desolate as if all gladness had departed ? 
 Why should we, who shall wear a crown, and 
 inherit all things, sigh or fret because of a few 
 years' poverty and shame? Earth's dream 
 will soon be done ; and then comes the day of 
 " songs and everlasting joy," the long reality 
 of bliss ! Jesus will soon be here ; and " when 
 He who is our life shall appear, then shall we 
 also appear with him in glory." 
 
 Shall trial shake us? Nay, in all this we 
 are more than conquerors through him that 
 loved us. Shall sorrow move us? Faith 
 tells us of a land where sorrow is unknown ! 
 Shall the death of saints move us ? Faith 
 tells us not to sorrow as those who have no 
 hope, for if we believe that Jesus died and rose 
 again, them also that sleep in Jesus will God 
 oring with him. Shall the pains and weari- 
 ness of this frail body move us ? Faith tells 
 us of a time at hand when this corruptible
 
 THE FAMILY LIFE. 29 
 
 shall put on incorruption, and death be swal- 
 lowed up in victory. Shall privation move us? 
 Faith tells us of a day when the poverty of our 
 exile shall be forgotten in the abundance of 
 our peaceful, plenteous home, where we shall 
 hunger no more, neither thirst any more. 
 Shall the disquieting bustle of this restless life 
 annoy us ? Faith tells us of the rest that re- 
 maineth for the people of God the sea of glass 
 like unto crystal on which the ransomed saints 
 shall stand no .tempest, no tumult, no ship- 
 wreck there. Shall the want of this world's 
 honors move us ? Faith tells us of the ex- 
 ceeding and eternal weight of glory in reserve. 
 Have we no place to lay our head? Faith 
 tells us that we have a home, though not in 
 Caesar's house, a dwelling, though not in any 
 city of earth. Are we fearful as we look 
 around upon the disorder and wretchedness of 
 this misgoverned earth? Faith tells us that 
 the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. Do 
 thoughts of death alarm us ! Faith tells us 
 that " to die is gain," and whispers to us, 
 " what, are you afraid of becoming immortal, 
 afraid of passing from this state of death, which 
 men call life, to that which alone truly deserves 
 the name !" 
 
 3*
 
 30 THE FAMILY LIFE. 
 
 Such is the family life a life of faith. We 
 live upon things unseen. Our life is hid with 
 Christ in God, that when he who is our life 
 shall appear, we may appear with him in glory. 
 This mode of life is not that of the world at all, 
 but the very opposite. Nevertheless it has been 
 that of the saints from the beginning. This 
 is the way in which they have walked, going 
 up through the wilderness leaning on their be- 
 loved. And such is to be the walk of the 
 saints till the Lord come. Oh ! how much is 
 there in these thoughts concerning it, not only 
 to reconcile us to it, but to make us rejoice in 
 it, and to say, I reckon that the sufferings of 
 this present life, are not worthy to be compar- 
 ed with the glory which shall be revealed in 
 us. For all things are ours, whether life or 
 death, things present or things to come, all are 
 ours ; for we are Christ's, and Christ is God's. 
 Yea, we are heirs of God, and joint heirs with 
 Jesus Christ. "This is the heritage of the 
 servants of the Lord, and their righteousness 
 is of me, saith the Lord."* 
 
 We know not a better type or specimen of 
 the family life than Abraham or Israel in 
 vheir desert wanderings. Look at Abraham. 
 * Is. liv. 17.
 
 THE FAMILY LIFE. 31 
 
 He quits all at the comir and of the God of 
 glory. This begins his life of faith. Then 
 he journeys onward not knowing whither. 
 Then he sojourns as a stranger in the land 
 which God had given him. Then he offers 
 up Isaac. Then he buys for himself a tomb, 
 where he may lay his dust till the day of 
 resurrection. All is faith. He lives and acts 
 as a stranger. He has no home. He has his 
 altar and his tent, but that is all. The one 
 he builds, wherever he goes, in the peaceful 
 consciousness of sin forgiven and. acceptance 
 found ; the other he pitches from day to day. 
 in token of his being a pilgrim and a stranger 
 upon earth. And what more does any mem- 
 ber of the family need below, but his altar 
 and his tent, a Saviour for a sinful soul, and 
 a shelter for a frail body, until journeying 
 days are done ? 
 
 Or look at Israel. They quit Egypt. There 
 the life of faith begins. Then they cross the 
 Red Sea. Then they take up their abode in 
 the desert. They have no city to dwell in 
 now. They have no flesh-pots now, nothing 
 but the daily manna for food. They have 
 no river of Egypt now, nothing but a rock 
 to yield them water. All is waste arounl
 
 32 THE FAMILY LIFE. 
 
 All is to be of faith, not of sight. They are 
 alone with God, and the whole world is afar 
 off. They rear their altar, they pitch their 
 tents, as did Abraham, with this only differ- 
 ence, that above their heads there floats a 
 wondrous cloud, which, like a heavenly cano- 
 py, stretches itself out over their dwellings 
 when they rest, or like an angel-guide takes 
 wing before them when God summons them 
 to strike their tents, that it may lead them in 
 the way. Nay, and as if to mark more viv- 
 idly the pilgrim condition of the family, God 
 himself when coming down into the midst of 
 them chooses a tent to dwell in. It is called 
 " the tabernacle of the Lord," or more literally 
 " Jehovah's tent." Jehovah pitches his tent 
 side by side with Israel's tents, as if he were 
 a stranger too, a wanderer like themselves ! 
 
 This is our life. We are to be strangers 
 with God as all our fathers were. It is the 
 life of the desert, not of the city. But what 
 of that? All is well. Jehovah is our God, 
 and we shall soon be in his " many man- 
 sions." Meanwhile we have the tent, the 
 altar, and the cloud. We need no more be- 
 low. The rest is secured for us in heaven, 
 " ready to be revealed in the last time."
 
 CHAPTER III. 
 
 THE FAMILY BADGE. 
 
 THE family of which we speak is gathered 
 out of every nation and kindred, and people, 
 and tongue. It is " a great multitude that no 
 man can number." 
 
 Yet it is but one family. There is a family 
 likeness among all its many members ; and a 
 family name by which they are known. They 
 have many things in common ; nay, there are 
 few things which are not common to all. They 
 are all of earth. It is their native clime. They 
 are all sprinkled with the same blood, and be- 
 gotten again by the same Spirit. They all 
 sing one song, use one language, rejoice in one 
 hope, and are heirs of one inheritance. This 
 oneness of feature and feeling and habit, 
 throughout so many ages and amid so many 
 diverse nations, marks them out as a peculiar 
 people, and reveals their relationship to him 
 who is "the same yesterday, and to-day and 
 for ever." 
 
 But they have one mark more peculiar than
 
 34 THE FAMILY BADGE. 
 
 any of these. It is truly a family-badge. They 
 are all cross-bearers. This is the unfailing 
 token by which each member may be recog- 
 nized. They all bear a cross. Nor do they 
 hide it as if ashamed of it. They make it 
 their boast. " God forbid that we should 
 glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ, by whom the world is crucified to us, 
 and we unto the world." Sometimes it is 
 lighter, and sometimes it is heavier ; sometimes 
 it has more of shame and suffering, and some- 
 times less, but still it is upon them. They 
 carry it with them wherever they go. And it 
 is always a cross : not merely so in name, but 
 in reality ; a token of reproach and sorrow. 
 Sometimes they are represented as carrying it; 
 and sometimes as being nailed to it ; but it is 
 still the cross. 
 
 They took it up when first they believed in 
 Jesus and owned him as their all. Then it 
 was that they forsook the world's tents and 
 went without the gate, bearing the reproach 
 of the crucified One. He whom they follow 
 both bare the cross and was nailed to it, and 
 why should they shrink from the like endur- 
 ance? Shall they be ashamed of him ? Shall 
 they not rather count it honorable to follow
 
 THE FAMILY BADGE. 35 
 
 where he has led the way, and to bear for him 
 some faint resemblance of what he bore foi 
 them? Shall any thing in the world be 
 esteemed more precious, more honorable, than 
 the cross of their beloved Lord 'I The world 
 derides and despises it, but it is the cross of 
 Jesus ; and that is ALL to them. As a saint of 
 other days, a cross-bearer of the olden time, 
 has said, " O blessed cross of Christ, there is 
 no wood like thine." 
 
 Besides, this was the Master's will. He 
 has laid on each the command to bear the 
 cross. " If any man will come after me, let 
 him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, 
 and follow me."* "He that taketh not his 
 cross and followeth after me is not worthy of 
 me."t The cross, then, is the badge of disci- 
 pleship, and no follower of the Lord can be 
 without it. The two things are inseparable. 
 God has joined them, and man cannot sunder 
 them. No cross, no saint. No cross, no Son. 
 We must carry his cross all our life long ; we 
 must be baptized with his baptism ; we must 
 endure his reproach ; we must glory in being 
 clothed with his shame. The flesh must be 
 
 * Luke ix. 23. t Matt. x. 38.
 
 36 THE FAMILY BADGE. 
 
 crucified with its affections and lusts : our 
 members must be mortified ; our old man must 
 take the place of shame ; we in whom the flesh 
 still remaineth, though its dominion is broken, 
 must be willing to appear as outcasts and ma- 
 lefactors before the world, as Jesus did when 
 he bore our sins upon the hill of shame. Jesus 
 then with his own hand lays the cross on each 
 one that comes to him, saying, "take this and 
 follow me." Take it and be reproached for 
 me. Take it and endure tribulation for me. 
 Take it and count all tilings but loss for the 
 excellency of the knowledge of Jesus Christ 
 thy Lord. Take it and be willing to go even 
 to prison or to death for me, not counting your 
 life dear unto you, that you may follow me to 
 the end, and receive the unfading crown. 
 Learn to endure the cross and to despise the 
 shame. 
 
 But farther, we have the Master's example 
 as well as the Master's will concerning this. 
 I do not mean merely that he hung upon the 
 cross. I do not refer simply to the fact of his 
 crucifixion. I mean much more than that. 
 That was but the closing scene of a whole life 
 of crucifixion. He was a cross-bearer from the 
 hour that he was laid in the manger. All hig
 
 THE FAMILY BADGE. 37 
 
 days he bore the cross. His life was but a 
 pilgrimage to Calvary with the cross upon his 
 shoulders. Tradition tells ui that, as he left 
 the Judgment Hall, he was led along th 
 " dolorous way," to Golgotha. But in truth his 
 whole course on earth was the mournful way. 
 It was all reproach and sorrow from his cradle 
 to his grave. His was a sorrowing life ; and 
 his death was but the summing up of his many 
 sorrows ; the gathering of them all together 
 and pressing them into his cup at once, till the 
 vessel burst, because it could hold no more. 
 And then, for Him, the cross and the shame 
 and the sorrow were at an end for ever. But 
 for us the cross remaineth still. 
 
 Throughout life he was the " man of sor- 
 rows." He was "acquainted with grief." 
 And herein we see something more of the 
 family badge, as it was displayed in the Elder 
 Brother. Acquaintanceship with grief ! This 
 is the description given us of it. It is not one 
 visit that makes us acquainted with a fellow 
 man. Companionship is the result of con- 
 tinued intercourse. So one sorrow does not 
 make us acquainted with grief, however deep 
 and sharp its pangs may be. It may be the 
 beginning of our acquaintanceship, but that 
 4
 
 38 THE FAMILY BADGE. 
 
 is all. There must be daily, hourly inter- 
 course. Thus it was with Jesus. Thirty- 
 three years daily converse with grief made 
 him acquainted with it. And so it is with us. 
 The saints are men of sorrows still : and 
 their acquaintanceship with grief must be ob- 
 tained by daily fellowship. The disciple is 
 not above his Master, nor the servant above 
 his Lord. We need not think of another 
 process than that which he underwent. He 
 was made perfect through sufferings, and so 
 must we. The Captain of our Salvation is, 
 hi this respect, the model and pattern of his 
 saved ones. We are " always to bear about 
 in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that 
 the life also of Jesus may be made manifest 
 in our body."* 
 
 It is the Lamb that we follow : the Lamb 
 " as it had been slain." This surely speaks 
 most plainly of the family badge. We are 
 followers of the man with the pierced hands 
 and feet ; the man who is covered all over 
 with the marks of the buffet and the scourge 
 and the spitting ; the man with the crown of 
 thorns. Yea ; he is our Elder Brother. He 
 is bone of our bone and flesh of our flesh. 
 * 2 Cor. iv. 10.
 
 THE FAMILY BADGE. 89 
 
 And if we see so distinctly the family badge 
 on him. shall we shrink from taking it up 
 and binding it in triumph, as a jewel, on our 
 forehead as a crown upon our head ? Sure- 
 ly the purple robe of mockery may beseem us 
 better than it suited Him. 
 
 There is one mark by which, from the be- 
 ginning, he has been distinguished as the 
 woman's seed predicted in Eden. It is the 
 bruised heel. This is, in truth, only another 
 way of expressing his character as the suffer- 
 ing, the crucified Son of Man. This was the 
 mark which God gave by which he was to be 
 known. Yet it was just at this stumbling 
 stone that Israel stumbled. They had no 
 eyes for the dying Saviour. The humbled 
 Jesus found no favor with them. The bruised 
 heel they could not aw T ay with. The very 
 mark which God set upon him as Messiah 
 was that on account of which Israel rejected 
 him. Yet it is the bruised heel in which we 
 rejoice. It is the man with the bruised heel 
 that has won our hearts. It -is him that we 
 follow : and his bruised heel we engrave upon 
 our banner as our most honorable badge. 
 
 The like bruising we look for as our por- 
 tion here. Nor are we ashamed of it. All
 
 40 THE FAMILY BADGE. 
 
 the saints before us have experienced it, and 
 are we better than they ? Shall the soldiers 
 of the last days be ashamed to wear the uni- 
 form which the army of the saints has gloried 
 in for six thousand years ? 
 
 It is very remarkable that the Apostle fixes 
 upon affliction as the mark of true Sonship. 
 Truly he makes it the family badge. Nay, he 
 makes it the test of our legitimacy. " What 
 son is he whom the father chasteneth not? 
 But if ye be without chastisement, whereof all 
 are partakers, then are ye bastards and not 
 sons."* Strong language this ! Had any but 
 an inspired apostle used it, there would have 
 been outcry against it as absurd and extrava- 
 gant. Let us, however, take it as it is, for we 
 know that it speaks the mind of God. Chas- 
 tisement is, then, really one of the chief marks 
 of our lawful 'and honorable birth. Were 
 this characteristic not to be found on us, we 
 should be lacking in one of the proofs of our 
 sonship. Our legitimacy might be called in 
 question. It might be said that he was not 
 recognizing us as his true-born sons, and that 
 either he had never received us as such, or had 
 rejected us. There must be the family badge. 
 * Heb. xii. 7, 8.
 
 THE FAMILY BADGE. 41 
 
 to establish our claim of birth, and to be a 
 pledge of paternal recognition on the part of 
 God our Father. 
 
 It is a solemn thought. Flesh and blood 
 shrink from it. We look around to see if there 
 be no way of escaping, and ask if it must be 
 so ? Yes, it must be, as we shall shortly see, 
 and the attempt to shun it is vain. Yet it is 
 also a blessed thought. It cheers us under 
 trial to remember that this is the Father's seal 
 set upon his true-born sons. Oh! how it 
 lightens the load to think that it is really the 
 pledge of our divine adoption. 
 
 We need not then count upon bright days 
 below, nor think to pass lightly over the plea- 
 sant earth, as if our life were but the " shadow 
 of a dream." Joy within we may expect, 
 "joy unspeakable and full of glory," for that is 
 the family-portion. But joy from without, the 
 joy of earth's sunshine, the joy of the world's 
 ease and abundance, the joy of unsevered 
 bonds and unweeping eyes, is not our lot in 
 this vale of tears. 
 
 Still, in the midst of the ever-wakeful storms 
 
 through which we are passing to the Kingdom, 
 
 there is peace deep peace too deep for any 
 
 storm of earth to reach. In the world we have 
 
 4*
 
 42 THE FAMILY BADGE. 
 
 tribulation, but in Jesus we have peace. "Peace 
 I leave with you, my peace I give unto you, 
 not as the world giveth give I unto you." And 
 it is this which gives the peculiar aspect to the 
 saints, the aspect of mingled joy and grief. 
 The eye is dim with tears, yet, behold ! it 
 glistens with joy. There is the brow of shaded 
 thought, yet peace is playing round it. Clouds 
 overshadow them, but on every cloud we see 
 calm sunshine resting. 
 
 Their " peace is like a river." It is not 
 stagnant as the lake, nor tumultuous as the 
 sea, but ever in calm motion, ever flowing on 
 in its deep channel, like a river. The course 
 may sometimes be through rocks, sometimes 
 through level plains, sometimes through tan- 
 gled brakes, sometimes along the corn-field or 
 ".the hill of vines," yet still it moves unhin- 
 dered on. It may be night or day, it may be 
 winter or summer, it may be storm or calm, 
 but it is there flowing on till the embrace of 
 ocean receives it. Such is our peace ! Let us 
 hold it fast. 
 
 Nor need we hide our peace any more than 
 we should hide our cross. Let the world see 
 both, and learn how well they agree together. 
 For it is the cross that makes this peace feel so
 
 THE FAMILY BADGB. 43 
 
 sweet and suitable. Amid the tears of grief, 
 peace keeps her silent place, like the rainbow 
 upon the spray of the cataract ; nor can it be 
 driven thence so long as Jehovah's sunshine 
 rests upon the soul. " The work of righteous- 
 ness shall be peace, and the effect of righteous- 
 ness, quietness and assurance for ever."
 
 CHAPTER IV. 
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 "TRAIN up a child in the way he should 
 go," is the injunction God lays on us. But it 
 is, moreover, the principle on which he himself 
 is acting with his Church. He is training up 
 his children here. This is the true character 
 of his dealings with them. The education of 
 his saints is the object he has in view. It is 
 training for the kingdom ; it is education for 
 eternity. 
 
 How momentous, then, is the training ! It 
 is God who is carrying it on by the Holy 
 Ghost. It is the Church, which is the body of 
 Christ, that is the subject of it. And it is to 
 prepare her for an everlasting kingdom ! In 
 bringing many sons unto glory, it was needful 
 that even the Captain of their salvation should 
 be made perfect through suffering. Surely 
 then God lays vast stress upon this discipline. 
 In his estimation it is no unimportant, nor un- 
 meaning exercise. Knowing this, the apostle 
 exhorts us on this very point, "My son, de-
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 45 
 
 spise not thou the chastening of the Lord." It 
 is too solemn to be despised, too momentous to 
 be overlooked. The education of God's family 
 is concerned in it. The preparation of an heir 
 of glory depends on it. 
 
 This discipline begins at our conversion. 
 The moment we are taken into the family it 
 commences. " He scourgeth ef ery son whom 
 he receiveth." It is not always visible ; neither 
 are we at all times conscious of its operation. 
 Nevertheless, from the very day that u we are 
 begotten again to a lively hope " it begins. 
 
 It ends only with life, or in the case of the 
 last generation of the church, with their being 
 " caught up to meet the Lord in the air." It is 
 a w r hole lifetime's process. It is a daily, an 
 hourly discipline, which admits of no cessation. 
 The rod may not always be applied, but still 
 the discipline goes on. 
 
 1. It is the discipline of love. Every step 
 of it is kindness. There is no wrath or ven- 
 geance in any part of the process. The dis- 
 cipline of the school may be harsh and stern ; 
 but that of the family is love. We are sure of 
 this ; and the consolation which it affords is 
 unutterable. Love will not wrong us. There 
 will be no needless suffering. Were this but
 
 46 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 kept in mind there would be fewer hard 
 thoughts of God amongst men, even when his 
 strokes were most severe. I know not a better 
 illustration of what the feelings of a saint 
 should be, in the hour of bitterness, than the 
 case of Richard Cameron's father. The aged 
 saint was in prison " for the Word of God and 
 the testimony of Jesus Christ." The bleeding 
 head of his martyred son was brought to him 
 by his unfeeling persecutors, and he was asked 
 derisively if he knew it. " I know it, I know 
 it ; " said the father, as he kissed the mangled 
 forehead of his fair-haired son, " it is my 
 son's ; my own dear son's ! It is the Lord ! 
 good is the will of the Lord, who cannot wrong 
 me or mine, but who hath made goodness and 
 mercy to follow us all our days." 
 
 2. It is the discipline of wisdom. He who 
 administers it, is the " God only wise." What 
 deep wisdom then must there be in all his 
 dealings. He knows exactly what we need, 
 and how to supply it. He knows what evils 
 are to be found in us, and how these may be 
 best removed. His training is no rauiom work. 
 It is carried on with exquisite skill. The time 
 and the way and the instrument, are all ac- 
 cording to the perfect wisdom of God. The
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 47 
 
 fittest time is chosen, just the very moment 
 when discipline was called for, and when it 
 would be most profitable. The surest, direct- 
 est, and at the same time most gentle method 
 is devised. The instrument which will be 
 surest yet safest, most effectual yet least pain- 
 ful, is brought into operation. For all is wis- 
 dom in this discipline of God. 
 
 3. It is the discipline of faithfulness. "In 
 faithfulness thou hast afflicted me," said Da- 
 vid. All is the doing of a faithful God, a 
 God who is faithful to us as well as faithful 
 to himself. " Faithful are the wounds of a 
 friend," says Solomon ; and the believer finds 
 in trouble the faithfulness of the truest of 
 friends. He is so faithful that he will not 
 pass by a single fault that he sees in us ; but 
 will forthwith make it known that it may be 
 removed. He gave this command to Israel, 
 " thou shall in any wise rebuke thy neigh- 
 bor, and not suffer sin upon him ;"* and he 
 himself acts upon the command he gave. He 
 is too faithful a father to suffer sin upon his 
 children unreproved. He is true to us, whether 
 in sending the evil or the good ; shall we not 
 Bay, more true and more faithful when he 
 * Lev. xix. 17.
 
 48 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 inflicts the evil, than when he bestows tha 
 good? It almost at times seems to break 
 the heart of a loving friend to be obliged to 
 say or do any thing severe towards the friend 
 he loves. Yet for love's sake he will do 
 it. In faithfulness he will not shrink from 
 it. And in doing so, is he not true to his 
 friend ? So with a chastening God. He is 
 faithful when he blesses more faithful when 
 he chastens. This surely is consolation. It 
 may well allay all murmuring, and stablish 
 our hearts in peace. 
 
 4. It is the discipline of power. He who 
 is carrying it on, is not one that can be baffled 
 and forced to give up his design. He is able 
 to carry it out in the unlikeliest circumstan- 
 ces and against the most resolute resistance. 
 Everything must give way before him. This 
 thought is, I confess, to me one of the most 
 comforting connected with the discipline. If 
 it could fail ! if God could be frustrated in 
 his designs after we have suffered so much, it 
 would be awful. To be scourged, and put to 
 pain, by one who is not able to make good to 
 us the profit of this, would add inconceivable 
 bitterness to the trial. And then our hearts 
 are so hard, our wills so stubborn, that nothing,
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 49 
 
 save an Almighty pressure applied to them 
 can work the desired change. Oh, when the 
 soul is at strife within itself, battling in despe- 
 rate conflict with its stormy lusts, when the 
 flesh rises up in its strength and refuses to 
 yield, when the whole heart appears like iron 
 or like adamant ; it is most blessed to think 
 upon God's chastisements as the discipline of 
 power. It is this that assures us that all shall 
 yet be well. And it is in the strength of this 
 assurance, that we gird ourselves for the bat- 
 tle, knowing'that we must be more than con- 
 querors through him that loved us. 
 
 There might be love in the dealing, love 
 to the uttermost, and yet all be in vain. 
 For love is oftentimes helpless, unable to do 
 aught for the beloved object. There might be 
 wisdom too, and yet it might prove wholly in- 
 effectual. There might also be untiring faith- 
 fulness, yet no results. It might be altogether 
 impotent even in its fondest vigilance. It 
 might be baffled in its most earnest attempts 
 to bless. But when it is infinite power that is 
 at work, we are sure of every obstacle being 
 surmounted, and every thing that is blessed 
 coming most surely to pass. My sick bed 
 may be most lovingly tended, most skillfully 
 5
 
 50 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 provided for, most faithfully watched : and I 
 may be most sweetly soothed by this fond and 
 unwearied care : yet, if there be no power to 
 heal, no resistless energy, such as sweeps all 
 hindrances before it, then I may still lie hope- 
 less there : but, if the power to heal be pre- 
 sent, the power that makes all diseases fly its 
 touch, the power that, if need be, can raise the 
 dead, then I know, of a truth, that all is well. 
 Oh, it is blessed and comforting' to remember 
 that it is the discipline of power that is at 
 work upon us. God's treatment must suc- 
 ceed. It cannot miscarry or be frustrated 
 even in its most arduous efforts, even in refer- 
 ence to its minutest objects. It is the mighty 
 power of God that is at work within us, and 
 upon us, and this is our consolation. It is the 
 grasp of an infinite hand that is upon us, and 
 nothing can resist its pressure. All is love, all 
 is wisdom, and all is faithfulness, yet all is 
 also power. The very possibility of failure is 
 thus taken away. Were it not for this power 
 there could be no certainty of blessing, and 
 were it not for this certainty, how poor and 
 partial would our comfort be. He, Ah yes, 
 He who chastises us is " ABLE to do exceed-
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 51 
 
 ing abundantly above all that we ask or think, 
 according to the power that worketh in us."* 
 
 Hence to a soul, conscious of utter helpless- 
 ness, and weary of the struggle within, be- 
 tween the spirit and the flesh, there is " strong 
 consolation'* 5 in remembering the power of him 
 whose hand is now grasping him so firmly on 
 every side. His sore-tossed spirit finds peace 
 in calling to mind " the years of the right 
 hand of the Most High ;" all the " works of 
 the Lord cnd his wonders of old." The 
 " strength of Israel" is the name he delights 
 in, as the name of his chastener. He thus 
 bethinks himself " The God that made these 
 heavens and stretched them out in their vast- 
 ness and majesty ; who moves these stars in 
 their courses and arrests them at a word, is 
 the God that is chastening me. He who raises 
 and stills the mighty deep with all the multi- 
 tude of its waves, the God of the tempest and 
 of the earthquake, ' the framer of light and 
 dark, the wielder of the lightning and the 
 builder of the everlasting hills, is the God who 
 is now laying his rod so heavily upon me." 
 Thus each new proof or aspect of Jehovah's 
 
 Eph. iii. 20.
 
 52 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 power, becomes a new source of consolation in 
 the day of chastisement and sorrow. 
 
 Such, then, is the nature of the family dis- 
 cipline when viewed in reference to God. 
 Love, wisdom, faithfulness, and power unite 
 to devise and carry it out. It must, then, be 
 perfect discipline, the completest and most 
 successful that can be thought of or desired. 
 It is well to look at it in this light ; for it is 
 thus that we become entirely satisfied with all 
 that comes to pass, and feel that " it is well." 
 But let us consider it in another aspect. We 
 have seen what it is when flowing out of 
 God ; let us see what it is when operating 
 upon man. 
 
 As we observed before, God's object in chas- 
 tisement is the education of his children, the 
 training up of the saints. It is their imper- 
 fect spiritual condition that makes this so ne- 
 cessary. And now we proceed to inquire in 
 what way it works, and towards what regions 
 of the soul it is specially directed. For while, 
 doubtless, it embraces the whole soul in all its 
 parts and powers, it may be well to consider 
 it as more especially set to work upon its 
 mind, its will, its heart, and its conscience. 
 
 1. It is the training of the mind. We are
 
 THE FAMILY DISCI! LINE. 53 
 
 naturally most untcachable as well as most 
 ignorant; neither knowing any thing nor will- 
 ing to know. The ease of prosperous days 
 augments the evil. God at length interposes 
 and compels us to learn. " The rod and re 
 proof give wisdom."* He sends trial, and that 
 makes us willing to learn. Our unteachable- 
 ness gives way. We become aware of our 
 ignorance. We seek teaching from on high. 
 God begins his work of instruction. Light 
 pours in on every side. We grow amazingly 
 in knowledge. We learn the meaning of 
 words now which we had hitherto used but as 
 familiar sounds. Scripture shines out before 
 us in new effulgence ; it flashes into us ; every 
 verse seems to contain a sunbeam ; dark places 
 become light ; every promise stands out in illu- 
 minated splendor; things hard to be under- 
 stood become in a moment plain. 
 
 How fast we learn in a day of sorrow ! It 
 is as if affliction awoke our powers, and lent 
 them new quickness of perception. We ad- 
 vance more in the knowledge of Scripture in a 
 single day than in years before. We learn 
 " songs in the night," though such music was 
 unknown before. A deeper experience has 
 
 * Prov. xxix. 15. 
 5*
 
 54 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 taken us down into the depths of Scripture, and 
 shown us its hidden wonders. Luther used to 
 say, " Were it not for tribulation I should not 
 understand Scripture." And every sorrowing 
 saint responds to this, as having felt its truth, 
 felt it as did David, when he said, " Blessed is 
 the man whom thou chastenest, and teachest 
 him out of thy law."* " It is good for me that I 
 have been afflicted ; that I might learn thy 
 statutes."! What teaching, what training of 
 the mind goes on upon a sick bed, or under 
 the pressure of grief! And, oh, what great 
 and wondrous things will even some little trial 
 whisper in the ear of a soul that is " learning 
 of the Father !" 
 
 In some cases t,his profit is almost unfelt, at 
 least during the continuance of the process. 
 We think that we are learning nothing. Sor- 
 row overwhelms us. Disaster stuns us. We 
 become confused, nervous, agitated, or perhaps 
 insensible. We seem to derive no profit. Yet 
 ere long we begin to feel the blessed results. 
 Maturity of judgment, patience in listening to 
 the voice of God, a keener appetite for his 
 word, a quicker discernment of its meaning 
 these are soon realized as the gracious results 
 
 * Ps. iciv. 12. t Ps. cxix. 71.
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 53 
 
 of chastisement. The mind has undergone a 
 most thorough discipline, and has, moreover, 
 made wondreus progress in the knowledge of 
 divine truth through the teaching of the Holy 
 Ghost. 
 
 2. It is the training of the will. The will 
 is the -eat of rebelliousness. Here the warfare 
 is carried on. " The flesh lusteth against the 
 spirit, and the spirit against the flesh." At 
 conversion the will is bent in the right direc- 
 tion, but it is still crooked and rigid. Rebel- 
 liousness is still there. Prosperous days may 
 sometimes conceal it, so that we are almost 
 unconscious of its strength. But it still exists. 
 Furnace-heat is needed for softening and 
 strengthening it. No milder remedy will do. 
 "It requires (says a suffering saint) all the 
 energy of God to bend my will to his." Yet 
 it must be done. The will is the soul's cita- 
 del. Hence it is the will that God seems so 
 specially to aim at in chastisement. Fire after 
 fire does he kindle in order to soften it ; and 
 blow r after blow does he fetch down on it to 
 straighten it. Nor does he rest till he has 
 made it thoroughly flexible, and hammered 
 out of it the many relics of self which- it con- 
 tains. He wilt not stay his hand till he has
 
 56 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 thoroughly marred our self-formed plans, and 
 shown us the folly of our self-chosen ways. 
 
 This is specially the case in long-continued 
 trials ; either when these come stroke after 
 stroke in sad succession, or when one fearful 
 stroke, at the outset, has left behind it conse- 
 quences which years perhaps will not fully 
 unfold. The bending and straightening of 
 the will is often a long process, during which 
 the soul has to pass through Avaters deep and 
 many, through fires hot and ever kindling up 
 anew. Protracted trials seem specially aimed 
 at the will. Its perversity and stiffness can 
 only be wrought out of it by a long succession 
 of trials. It is only by degrees that it becomes 
 truly pliable, and is brought into harmony with 
 the will of God. We can at a stroke lop off 
 the unseemly branch ; but to give a proper 
 bent to the tree itself, we require time and assi- 
 duous appliances for months or years. Yet the 
 will must give way. However proud, however 
 froward, it must bend. God will not leave it 
 till he has made it one with his own.* 
 
 3. It is the training of the heart. Man's 
 heart beats false to God. It is true to many 
 
 * " Character is a perfectly educated will," says a German 
 writer.
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 57 
 
 things but false to him. When first the Holy 
 Spirit touches it, and shows it " the exceeding 
 riches of the grace of God," then it becomes in 
 some measure true. Yet it is only in part. 
 Much false-heartedness still remains. It clings 
 too fondly to the creature. It cleaves to the 
 dust. It is not wholly God's. But this cannot 
 be. God must have the heart ; nay, and he 
 must have it beating truly towards him. He 
 is jealous of our love, and grieves, over its fee- 
 bleness or its falling away. It is love that he 
 wants, and with nothing but true-hearted love 
 will he be satisfied. For this it is that he 
 chastises. These false throbbings of the heart ; 
 these goings out after other objects than him- 
 self, he cannot suffer, but must correct, or else 
 forego his claim. Hence he smites and spares 
 not till he has made us sensible of our guilt in 
 this respect. He strips off the leaves whose 
 beauty attracted us ; he cuts down the flowers 
 whose fragrance fascinated us ; he tears off one 
 string after another from the lyre whose music 
 charmed us. Then when he has shewed us 
 each object of earth in its nakedness or de- 
 formity, then he presents himself to us in the 
 brightness of his own surpassing glory. And 
 thus he wins the heart. Thus he makes it
 
 58 THE FAMILY DISCIPL3 V T E. 
 
 true to him. Thus he makes us ashamed of 
 our false-heartedness to himself, and to the Son 
 of his love. 
 
 Yet this is no easy process. This training 
 is hard and sore. The heart bleeds under it. 
 Yet it must go on. No part of it can be 
 spared. Nor will it cease till the heart is won ! 
 If the chastener should stay his hand before 
 this is effected, where would be his love ? 
 What poor, what foolish affection ! He knew 
 this when he said, " let them alone ;" and it 
 was the last thing that his love consented to 
 do, after all else had failed. One of the 
 sharpest, sorest words he ever spoke to Israel, 
 was, " why should ye be stricken any more." 
 Let us remember this, and not faint, even 
 though the heart has been long bleeding. Let 
 us remember it, and seek to make the sorrow 
 shorter, by gladly joining with him in his plan 
 for getting possession of our whole heart. We 
 need not grudge it. He has " good measure" 
 to give us in return. His love will taste the 
 sweeter, and it will abide and satisfy us for 
 ever. And it is well for us to be thus trained 
 up to love him here, with whom, in love and 
 fellowship unbroken, we are to spend the ever- 
 lasting day.
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 59 
 
 4. It is the training of the conscience. A 
 seared conscience is the sinner's heritage. It 
 is upon this that the Holy Spirit first lays his 
 hand when he awakens the soul from its sleep 
 of death. He touches the conscience, and 
 then the struggles of conviction come. He 
 then pacifies it by the sprinkling of the blood, 
 shewing it Jesus and his cross. Then giving 
 it to taste forgiveness, it rests from all its tu- 
 mults and fears. Thoughts of peace are ever 
 breathed into it from the sight of the bleeding 
 sacrifice. It trembles no more ; for it sees 
 that that which made it tremble, is that very 
 thing concerning which the blood of Christ 
 speaks peace. " Their sins and their iniqui- 
 ties will 1 remember no more." Thus it is 
 softened. Its first terrors upon awakening 
 could not be called a softening. But now 
 conscious forgiveness and realized peace with 
 God, have been to it, like the mild breath of 
 spring to the ice of winter. It has become 
 soft and tender. Yet only so in part. 
 
 God's desire, however, is to make it alto- 
 gether tender. He wishes it to be sensitive in 
 regard to the very touch of sin, and earnest in 
 its pantings after perfect holiness. To effect 
 ihis, he afflicts ; and affliction goes directly
 
 60 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 home to the conscience. The death of the 
 widow's son at Sarepta, immediately awaken- 
 ed her conscience, and she cried to the pro- 
 phet, " O man of God, art thou come to call 
 my sin to remembrance ?"* So God, by chas- 
 tisement, lays his finger upon the conscience, 
 and forthwith it starts up into new life. We 
 are made to feel as if God had now come 
 down to ITS ; as if he were now looking into 
 our hearts, and commencing a narrow search. 
 Moreover, we see, in this affliction, God's esti- 
 mate of sin. Not, indeed, the full estimate. 
 No, that we only learn from the sufferings of 
 Jesus. But still we gather somewhat of his 
 mind regarding sin, from this new specimen 
 of sin's bitter fruits. This teaches the con- 
 science, by making the knowledge of sin a 
 thing of experience, an experience that is 
 deepening with every new trial. " If they be 
 bound in fetters, and be holden in cords of 
 affliction, then he sheweth them their work 
 and their transgressions that they have ex- 
 ceeded. He openeth also their ear to disci* 
 pline, and commandeth that they return from 
 iniquity."t 
 In these last days how little is there of ten- 
 
 * 1 Kings xvii. 18. t Job xxxvi. 8, 9, 10.
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 61 
 
 derness of conscience ! The world seems to 
 know nothing of it save the name. It is a 
 world without a conscience ! And how much 
 do we find the church of Christ a partaker in 
 the world's sins. " Evil communications cor 
 rupt good manners." It is sad to observe in 
 many saints, amid much zeal, and energy, 
 and love, the lack of a tender conscience. 
 For this God is smiting us, and will smite 
 us yet more heavily, until he has made it 
 thoroughly tender and sensitive all over ; 
 u hating even the garments spotted by the 
 flesh." This training of the conscience is a 
 thing of far greater moment than many deem 
 it. God will riot rest till he has wrought it. 
 And if the saints still continue to overlook it ; 
 if they will not set themselves in good earnest 
 to ask for it, and to strive againct every thing 
 that would tend to produce searedness and in- 
 sensibility, they may yet expect some of the 
 sharpest strokes that the hand of God ha3 
 ever yet administered. 
 
 Such, then, is the family discipline ! We 
 have seen it as it comes forth from God, ard 
 we have seen it as it operates upon man. 
 And is it not all well 1 What is there about 
 it that should disquiet us, or call forth one 
 6
 
 62 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 murmur, either of the lip or heart ? 
 which opens up to us so much more of God, 
 and lets us more fully into the secrets of his 
 heart, must be blessed, however hard to bear. 
 That which discovers to us the evils within 
 ourselves, which makes us teachable and 
 wise, which gives to the stiff w r ill flexibility 
 and obedience, which teaches the cold heart to 
 love and expands each straitened affection, 
 which melts the callous conscience into ten- 
 der sensitiveness, which trains up the whole 
 soul for the glorious kingdom, tjmt must be 
 precious indeed. 
 
 Besides it is the Father's will ; and is not 
 this enough for the trustful child ? Is not 
 chastisement just one of the methods by 
 which he intimates to us what he would have 
 us to be ? Is not his way of leading us to the 
 kingdom, the safest, surest, shortest way ? It 
 is still the paternal hand that is guiding us. 
 What though in seeking to lift us up to a 
 higher level, it has to lay hold of us with a 
 firmer, or it may be a rougher grasp ? It is 
 still the paternal voice " that speaketh unto us 
 as unto children," dear children only in a 
 louder, sharper tone, to constrain the obedience 
 of his too-reluctant sons.
 
 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 63 
 
 One remark more would I add to these con- 
 cerning this family discipline. It is not de- 
 signed even for a moment to separate between 
 them and their God, or to overshadow their 
 souls with one suspicion of their Father's 
 heart. That it has done so at times, I know ; 
 but that it ought never to do so I am most 
 firmly persuaded. Is it not one of the tests of 
 sonship, and shall that, without which we are 
 not accounted sons, make us doubt our son- 
 ship, or suspect the love of our God ? That 
 love claims at all times, whether in sorrow or 
 in joy, our simple, full-hearted, peaceful con- 
 fidence. It is at all times the same, and chas- 
 tisement is but a more earnest expression of its 
 infinite sincerity and depth. Let us do justice 
 to it, and to him out of whom it flows. Let 
 us not give it the unworthy treatment which 
 it too often receives at our thankless hands. 
 Let us beware of " falling from grace," at the 
 very time when God is coming down to us, to 
 spread out before us, more largely than before, 
 all the treasures of his grace. " We have 
 known and believed the love that God hath to 
 us," is to be our song. It ought always to be 
 the family-song ! And shall it cease or sink 
 low at the very time when it ought to be
 
 64 THE FAMILY DISCIPLINE. 
 
 loudest and strongest? Should not trial jusi 
 draw from us the apostle's triumphant boast ? 
 " Who shall separate us from the love of 
 Christ ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or per- 
 secution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or 
 sword ? Nay, in all these things we are more 
 than conquerors through him that loved us ; 
 for I am persuaded that neither death, nor life, 
 nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor 
 things present, nor things to come, nor height, 
 nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be 
 able to separate us from the love of God, 
 which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."* For is 
 it not just when we are brought under chas- 
 tening, that w r e enter upon the realities of con- 
 solation, the certainties of love, and the joyg 
 of heavenly fellowship, in ways unknown and 
 unimagined before ? 
 
 * Rom. viii. 35.
 
 CHAPTER Y. 
 
 THE FAMILY RODS. 
 
 WE heai of the " rod of the wicked," and we 
 are told that it ' shall not rest upon the lot of 
 the righteous."* This may mean that wicked 
 men are God's rod for chastening his people, 
 and that,, though permitted to light upon 
 them, it shall not rest or abide upon them, but 
 shall be destroyed, as was the Assyrian, who 
 was used by God as the "rod of his anger" for 
 afflicting Israel. In this sense it gives us the 
 blessed assurance that the triumph of the 
 wicked over the saints is short ; that their de- 
 vices and oppressions shall last but for a mo- 
 ment, and that the church's sufferings at their 
 hands shall soon be over. Wicked men may 
 be " the sword of God,"t as was Pilate, when 
 he lifted the sword against the man that was 
 Jehovah's fellow, or as Herod was when he be- 
 headed John in prison; but that sword shall 
 soon be broken. A wound now and then it 
 may inflict, but that is all. It neither moves 
 
 * Ps. cxxv. 3. t Ps. xvii. 13. 
 
 6*
 
 66 THE FAMILY RODS. 
 
 nor smites, save when God allows. Nor does 
 it come, save with a blessing on its edge. 
 " They mean it not so," yet God means it. and 
 that is enough for us. He makes the wrath 
 of man to praise him. " There shall no evil 
 happen to the just ; when he shall hear of evil 
 tidings he shall not be afraid." 
 
 But the " rod of the wicked " may mean that 
 rod, with which he smites the wicked in his 
 fierce anger. In this sense there is no rod fo.r 
 the righteous. Such a rod never either lights 
 upon them nor rests upon them. Their rod is 
 not the rod of the wicked. It is the family 
 rod. They have done with wrath. Over 
 them no curse can ever rest. " There is no 
 condemnation to them that are in Christ 
 Jesus." The rod may seem to speak of frowns 
 and anger ; but it is only a seeming ; there is 
 not a glance of vengeance in the chastener's 
 eye. It is a correcting rod, but not a destroy- 
 ing one. Its object is not to punish but to 
 chasten ; not to injure but to bless. " God dis- 
 tributeth sorrows in his anger,"* but these are 
 not for his saints. 
 
 God has, however, not one rod for his chil 
 dren, but many. For each child he has a 
 
 * Job xii. 17.
 
 THE FAMILY RODS. 67 
 
 peculiar rod, and at different times he uses 
 different rods. It will be profitable for us to 
 consider what those are, and how they are ap- 
 plied. 
 
 1. Bodily sickness. The body operates very 
 powerfully upon the soul both for good and 
 evil. In what way or to what extent we can- 
 not tell. Nor do I wish to discuss this ques- 
 tion at all. But, knowing how the soul is 
 acted on by the body, I cannot help thinking 
 that one of God's designs in sickness is to ope- 
 rate upon the soul through the body. We are 
 not conscious of this ; we cannot analyze the 
 process ; the effects are hidden from view. Yet 
 it does seem as if sickness of body were made 
 to contribute directly to the health of the soul 
 in some way or other known only to God. 
 Hence the apostle speaks of " delivering such 
 an one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, 
 that the spirit may be saved in the day of the 
 Lord Jesus."* On this point, however, I do 
 not dwell ; only it would be well for us to con- 
 sider whether God is not by this intimating to 
 us the exceeding danger of pampering the 
 flesh : for the weakening of the flesh does help 
 forward the strengthening of the spirit ; and 
 
 * 1 Cor. v. 5.
 
 68 THE FAMILY RODS. 
 
 the mortifying of our members which are upon 
 the earth, the crucifying the flesh with its 
 affections and lusts, does tend to quicken and 
 invigorate the soul. Apart, however, from this, 
 there are other things to be kept in view. 
 
 Sickness prostrates us. It cuts into the very 
 centre of our carnal nature; it exposes in all 
 their deformity " the lust of the flesh, the lust 
 of the eye, and the pride of life." What vanity 
 is seen in these upon a sick bed. These are 
 our three idols ; and these, sickness dashes 
 down into the dust. 
 
 Sickness takes us aside and sets us alone 
 with God. We are taken into his private 
 chamber, and there he converses with us face 
 to face. The world is far off, our relish for it 
 is gone, and we are alone with God. Many 
 are the words of grace and truth which he then 
 speaks to us. All our former props are struck 
 away, and we must now lean on God alone. 
 The things of earth are felt to be vanity; man's 
 help useless. Man's praise, and man's sympa- 
 thy desert us ; we are cast wholly upon God, 
 that we may learn that his praise and his sym- 
 pathy are enough. " If it was not for pain," 
 says one, " I should spend less time with God. 
 If I had not been kept awake with pain, I
 
 THE FAMILY RODS. 69 
 
 should have lost one of the sweetest experi- 
 ences I ever had in my life. The disorder of 
 my body is the very help I want from God ; 
 and if it does its work before it lays me in the 
 dust, it will raise me up to heaven." It was 
 thus that Job was '-'chastened upon his bed 
 with pain, and the multitude of his bones with 
 strong pain," that after being tried he might 
 " come forth as gold."* 
 
 Sickness teaches that activity of service is 
 not the only way in which God is glorified. / 
 " They also serve who only stand and wait." 
 Active duty is that which man judges most 
 acceptable ; but God shews us, that in bearing 
 and suffering he is also glorified. Perhaps we 
 were pursuing a path of our own, and required 
 to be arrested. Perhaps W 7 e were too much 
 harassed by a bustling world and needed re- 
 tirement, yet could find no way of obtaining it 
 till God laid us down, and drew us aside into 
 a desert place, because of the multitude press- 
 ing upon us. 
 
 No one of the family rods is more in use 
 
 than this, sometimes falling lightly on in at 
 
 other times more heavily. Let us kisr the 
 
 rod. Let us open our mouth wide tp the 
 
 * Job xiiii. 10.
 
 70 THE FAMILY RODS. 
 
 blessing, seeking so to profit by each bodily 
 ailment, slight or severe, that it may bring forth 
 in us the peaceable fruits of righteousness. 
 " I know," says one, " of no greater blessing 
 than health, except pain and sickness." 
 ' 2. Bereavement. This is the bitterest of 
 all earthly sorrows. It is the sharpest arrow 
 in the quiver of God. To love tenderly and 
 deeply and then to part ; to meet together for 
 the last time on earth ; to bid farewell for 
 time ; to have all past remembrances of home 
 and kindred broken up ; this is the reality of 
 sorrow. To look upon that face that shall 
 , smile on us no more ; to close those eyes that 
 shall see us no more ; to press those lips that 
 , shall speak to us no more ; to stand by the 
 . cold side of father, mother, brother, sister, 
 friend, yet hear no sound and receive no greet- 
 ing ; to carry to the tomb the beloved of our 
 hearts, and then to return to a desolate home 
 with a blank in one region of our souls, which 
 shall never again be filled till Jesus come with 
 all his saints; this is the bitterness of grief ; this 
 is the wormwood and the gall ! 
 
 It is this rod which ever and anon God is 
 
 laying upon us. Nor is there any that we 
 
 . need more than this. By it he is making
 
 THE FAMILY RODS. 71 
 
 room for himself in hearts that had been filled 
 with other objects and engrossed with other 
 loves. He is jealous of our affection, for he 
 claims it all as his own ; and every idol he will 
 utterly abolish. For our sakes as well as for 
 his own he can suffer no rival in the heart. 
 Perhaps the joys of an earthly home are steal- 
 ing away our hearts from the many mansions 
 above. God breaks in upon us in mercy, and 
 turns that home into a wilderness. Our sin 
 finds us out ; we mourn over it and seek anew 
 to realize our heavenly citizenship and set out 
 anew upon our pilgrim way ; alone and yet not 
 alone for the Father is with us. Perhaps we 
 are sitting " at ease in Zion," comfortable and 
 contented, amid the afflictions of a suffering 
 church and the miseries of a world that owns 
 no Saviour and fears no God. Jehovah speaks 
 and we awake. He takes to himself some 
 happy saint, or smites to the dust some 
 wretched sinner. We are troubled at the 
 stroke. We mourn our lethargy. While we 
 slept, a fellow saint has gone up to be with 
 Christ, and a fellow sinner has gone down to 
 be with the devil and his angels. The death 
 of the one stirs us up, the death of the other 
 solemnizes and overawes us.
 
 72 THE FAMILY RODS. 
 
 Thus as saint after saint ascends to God, 
 we begin to feel that heaven is far more truly 
 the family home than earth. We have far 
 more brethren above than we have below. 
 And each bereavement reminds us of this. It 
 reminds us too that the coming of the Lord 
 draweth nigh, and makes us look out more 
 wistfully from our eastern casement for the 
 first streaks of the rising dawn. It kindles in 
 us strong desires for the day of happy meet- 
 ing in our Father's house, when we shall 
 clasp inseparable hands and climb in company 
 the everlasting hills. Meanwhile it bids us 
 give our hearts to Jesus only. It does for us 
 what the departure of the two strangers from 
 heaven did to the disciples on the mount of 
 transfiguration ; it leaves us alone with Je- 
 sus. It turns into deep experience that long- 
 ing for home contained in the apostle's words, 
 "having a desire to depart and to be with 
 Christ which is far better." 
 
 The more that bereavement transforms 
 earth into a desert, the more are our desires 
 drawn up to heaven. Our treasures having 
 been transferred to heaven, our hearts must 
 follow them. Earth's hopes are smitten, and 
 we are taught to look for " that blessed hope,
 
 THE FAMILY RODS. 73 
 
 the glorious appearing of the great God and 
 our Saviour Jesus Christ." The night is fall- 
 ing and the flowers are folding up ; but as 
 they do so they bid us look upward and see 
 star after star coming out upon the darken- 
 ing sky. 
 
 3. Adversity. This may be the loss of 
 substance, or it may be the loss of our good 
 name, or it may be the falling away of 
 friends, or it may be the wrath of enemies, or 
 it may be the disappointment of our hopes ; 
 these are what are meant by adversity. But 
 let Job tell us what it means. " Behold 
 He breaketh down and it cannot be built 
 again, he shutteth up a man and there can 
 be no opening."* " He hath made me weary ; 
 thou hast made desolate all my company. I 
 was at ease, but he hath broken me asunder, 
 he hath also taken me by my neck and sha- 
 ken me to pieces and set me up for his mark ; 
 his archers compass me about, he cleaveth my 
 reins asunder and doth not spare ; he break- 
 eth me with breach upon breach, he runneth 
 upon me like a giant ; my face is foul with 
 weeping, and on my eyelids is the shadow of 
 death."t "My days are past, my purposes 
 
 * Job xii. 14. f J b x*i. 7, 12, 13, 14, 16. 
 7
 
 74 THE FAMILY RODS. 
 
 are broken off, even the thoughts of my 
 heart."* " He hath fenced up my way that I 
 cannot pass, and he hath set darkness in my 
 paths ; he hath stripped me of my glory and 
 taken the crown from my head ; he hath 
 destroyed me on every side and I am gone, 
 and mine hope hath he removed like a tree ; 
 he hath put my brethren far from me and 
 mine acquaintance are verily estranged from 
 me."t These are some of the drops inthe bit- 
 ter cup of adversity that was given to that pa- 
 tient saint to drink. And they are recorded 
 for our use, on whom the ends of the world 
 have come, and to whom these last days may 
 perhaps fill a cup as bitter and protracted as 
 his. 
 
 , Yet let us count it all joy when we fall into 
 divers tribulations, knowing this, that the try- 
 ing of our faith worketh patience : but " let 
 patience have her perfect work that we may 
 be perfect and entire, wanting nothing."! 
 We are cast into poverty, but how can we be 
 poor so long as Christ is rich ; and is not this 
 poverty sent to make vis prize his unsearch- 
 able riches and to buy of him the gold tried 
 in the fire, that we may be rich ? Our gooc" 
 * Job xvii. 11. t Job xix, 8, 13. { James i. 2.
 
 THT- FAMILY RODS. 75 
 
 name is lost through slander and false accusa- 
 tion. The finger of public scorn is perhaps 
 pointed against us, and wicked men are ex- 
 alted over us triumphing in our reproach. 
 Yet have we not the approving eye of God, 
 and is it not enough if he still honors us and 
 knows our innocence ? Let our good name 
 go if God sees fit thus to humble us. We 
 have " the white stone and in the stone a new 
 name written which no man knoweth save he 
 that receiveth it."* Friends fall off and ene- 
 mies arise : false brethren turn against us, and 
 we are doomed to bear the revilings and per- 
 secutions of those whom we have never 
 wronged but ever loved. But the friendship 
 of Jesus is still ours. No earthly disaster or 
 persecutor can ever rob us of that. Nay, the 
 coldness of those we counted on as tried and 
 true, only draws us the closer to him, the 
 warmth of whose love knows no abatement 
 nor end. Joseph passed thoroughly this trial 
 and the Lord set him upon Pharaoh's throne. 
 Moses passed through it and became " king in 
 Jeshurun." Job passed through it and was 
 blessed a thousand fold. Daniel passed 
 'hrough it and was exalted with double hon 
 
 Rev. ii. 17.
 
 76 THE FAMILY RODS. 
 
 or. Let us " take then the prophets who 
 have spoken to us in the name of the Lord 
 for an example of suffering, affliction, and of 
 patience. Behold, we count them happy 
 which endure. Ye have heard of the pa- 
 tience of Job, and have seen the end of the 
 Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of ten- 
 der rnercy."* 
 
 Oftentimes nothing but adversity will do for 
 us. " I spake unto thee in thy prosperity, but 
 thou saidst, I will not hear ; this hath been 
 thy manner from thy youth, that thou obey- 
 edst not my voice. "t We need to be stripped 
 of every earthly portion that we may seek en- 
 tirely our portion in Jehovah himself. We 
 need to be turned out of a home on earth, 
 that we may seek a home in heaven. Earth's 
 music is too seducing, and takes away our re- 
 lish for the new song. God must either hush 
 it or take us apart into a desert place that we 
 may no longer be led captive by it, but may 
 have our ear open only to the heavenly me- 
 lody. We cannot be trusted with too full a 
 cup, or too pleasant a resting-place. We 
 abuse every thing that God has given us, and 
 prove ourselves not trust-worthy as to any one 
 
 * James v. 10* t Jer. xxii. 21.
 
 THE FAMILY RODS. 77 
 
 of them. Some God cannot trust with health ; 
 they need sickness to keep them low and 
 make them walk softly all their days. They 
 need spare diet, lest the flesh should get the 
 mastery. Others he cannot trust with pros- 
 perity ; they need adversity to humble them, 
 lest, like Jeshurun, they should wax "fat and 
 kick." Others he cannot trust with riches ; 
 they must be kept poor, lest covetousness 
 should spring up and pierce them through 
 with many sorrows. Others he cannot trust 
 with friends ; they make idols of them, they 
 give their hearts to them ; and this interferes 
 with the claims of Jehovah to have us alto- 
 gether as his own. 
 
 But still, in all this, God dealeth with us 
 as with the members of his own family. Never 
 for a moment does he lose sight of this. Neither 
 should we. So that when these things over- 
 take us, when we are thus "judged," we should 
 feel that we are " chastened of the Lord, 'that 
 we should not be condemned with the world :" 
 we should learn not merely to submit to the 
 rod, but to kiss and welcome it, not merely to 
 acquiesce in chastisement, but to "glory in 
 tribulation, knowing that tribulation worketh 
 patience, and patience experience, and expe- 
 7*
 
 78 THE -FAMILY RODS. 
 
 rience hope, and hope maketh not ashamed." 
 We should learn not merely to praise God in 
 affliction, but to praise him for it. We should 
 see that the lot of the afflicted is far more envia- 
 ble than that of him who is " let alone ;" and, 
 instead of trembling when we see the dark cloud 
 of sorrow coming over us, we should tremble 
 far more when we see it passing off, lest, per- 
 chance, that which came charged with bless- 
 ing to us, should, through our stout-hearted- 
 ness and unteachableness, leave us callous and 
 unblest.
 
 CHAPTER VI. 
 
 THE TYPES. 
 
 THE ordinance in Israel concerning the 
 meat-offering of the first fruits, was of a very 
 peculiar kind. Thus it was commanded, " If 
 thou offer a meat-offering of thy first fruits unto 
 the Lord, thou shall offer for the meat-offering 
 of thy first fruits, green ears of corn dried by 
 the fire."* 
 
 Christ is, we know, pre-eminently the first 
 fruits. It is he, then, who is specially pre- 
 figured by these green ears of corn dried by 
 the fire. In this " corn," we discern the type 
 of one who belongs to earth, partaker of our 
 very nature. It springs up in our fields, it is 
 nourished by our soil, it is watered by our 
 showers, it is ripened by our sun. So was it 
 with Jesus. lie was truly man, one of us, " the 
 Word made flesh," the man who "drank of the 
 brook by the way." 
 
 This corn was to be plucked when green, 
 and then dried by the fire ; not in the ordinary 
 
 * Lev. ii. 14.
 
 80 THE TY^'ES. 
 
 gradual way by the heat of the sun. It was to 
 be prematurely ripened, and by what we would 
 call unnatural means, the exposure to artificial 
 heat. In this also, we see Jesus, the man of 
 sorrows, subjected to the Father's wrath, the 
 wrath of him who is a consuming fire, and 
 withered into ripeness before his time. He did 
 not come to his grave "in a full age, like a 
 shock of corn in its season."* He did not grow 
 up to manhood in the calm refreshing sunshine 
 of Jehovah's smile. He was scorched with 
 fiery heat, within and without, till age appeared 
 upon his much-marred visage, while as yet the 
 greenness of his strength was upon him ; so 
 that the Jews, looking upon his wasted form, 
 spoke of him as one who had well nigh reached 
 his fiftieth year.t 
 
 Such is the view he gives of himself in the 
 book of Psalms. In these we at once recog- 
 nize the " green ears of corn dried by the fire." 
 For thus he speaks, " My strength is dried up 
 like a potsherd, and my tongue cleave th to my 
 jaws, and thou hast brought me unto the dust 
 of death."]: Again, he says, " Mine eye is con- 
 sumed with grief, yea, my soul and my belly ; 
 for my life is spent with grief, and my years 
 
 * Job v. 26. t John viii. 57. t Ps. xxii. 15.
 
 THE TYPES. 81 
 
 with sighing; my strength faileth, my bones 
 are consumed."* Again, we hear him saying, 
 " Mine eye is consumed because of grief, it 
 waxeth old because of all mine enemies."! 
 Such, then, was Jesus ; withered and dried up 
 before his time by reason of the sorrow which 
 he endured for us. 
 
 But these green ears dried up by the fire are 
 no less a description of the saints than of their 
 Lord. Certainly they apply to him, in a way 
 such as they never can apply to us. Yet still 
 they do stand forth as a type of the whole 
 church, who are also called like Jesus, " the 
 first fruits." All the members of his body, from 
 the beginning, have been just such as these 
 dried ears of green corn. Hear, for instance, 
 one of them speaking ; " I am like a bottle in 
 the smoke ;" or again, " My bones waxed old 
 through my roaring all the day long ; my mois- 
 ture is turned into the drought of summer."* 
 
 By such an emblem as this, was the church's 
 career of tribulation set before Israel. And it 
 is most interesting for us to look at our trials 
 in the light of so expressive a figure. Their 
 object is to ripen us : it may be before the time ; 
 it may be in a. way such as the flesh shrinks 
 
 * Ps. xxxi. 9. t Ps. vi. 7. t Ps. xxxii. 4.
 
 82 THE TYPES. 
 
 from ; but still, their object is to ripen us. The 
 sorrows that compass us about are all ripening 
 our graces, as well as withering out of us the 
 green, rank, unripe luxuriance of earth. The 
 heat may be great, but it shall not consume 
 us ; it will only make the ripening process a 
 speedier one. It will shorten the way to per- 
 fect holiness and eternal glory : and shall we 
 shrink from that which makes the process 
 shorter ? 
 
 But there was another ordinance in Israel 
 setting forth the tribulation of the church. 
 The mercy-seat and the cherubim were to be 
 both made of pure gold, " of beaten work."* 
 Now, as the cherubim were doubtless the 
 symbols of redeemed men, the church of 
 Christ, this type, is very striking. Both the 
 mercy-seat and the cherubim were to be of one 
 piece, for " both he who sanctifieth and they 
 who are sanctified are all of one." They are 
 of pure gold, and this denotes their exceeding 
 preciousness. They are made of " beaten 
 gold," to intimate the process through which 
 they both had passed. The mercy-seat was 
 fashioned into shape, and made after the pat- 
 tern shewed hi the mount, by the stroke of the 
 * Ex. xxv. 17, 18.
 
 THE TYPES. 83 
 
 hammer. So Jesus was " made perfect through 
 suffering." In like manner the cherubim were 
 to be beaten into the intended shape and model. 
 So with the saints. It is through this process 
 that they must pass, and it is thus they are 
 brought into that perfect shape which God has 
 designed for them. 
 
 What, then, is the process through which 
 the saints are passing now, but just this 7 
 They are now under the hammer of the Spirit, 
 that by this they may be fashioned into the 
 likeness of cherubim, which, in the Book of 
 Revelation, are set' before us as the upbearers 
 of Jehovah's throne and glory, as well as the 
 inheritors thereof. And what is all the " beat- 
 ing" to which we may be subjected, when 
 compared with the glory for which it is pre- 
 paring us? 
 
 There is another figure used by our Lord in 
 speaking of his church. He compares her to 
 an injured, afflicted, friendless widow. Widow- 
 hood, then, is properly the church's condition 
 here. And this is her grief. Her Lord is ab- 
 sent, and his absence is one of her bitterest 
 trials. It forms one long-continued sorrow. It 
 makes such a blank on earth, that we feel as 
 if this of itself were grief enough, even were
 
 84 THE TYPES. 
 
 there none besides. And were the church 
 fully to realize her estate of widowhood, until 
 the Lord come, she would find in this, no 
 doubt, a new grief to which she was blind be- 
 fore, but a grief which operates with most 
 blessed efficacy in sanctifying her, and in 
 keeping her apart from the world. 
 
 She is a stranger in a land of strangers. 
 She is lonely and unfriended, sitting apart from 
 earthly joy and fellowship. He whom she 
 loves is far away. This separation is, as a 
 saint of old expresses it, " like a mountain of 
 iron upon her heavy heart." She longs to be 
 with him. She sighs for the day of meeting. 
 And all this, though sad, is both sanctifying 
 and solemnizing. It is a daily burden, a con- 
 tinual chastening, yet it is well. It loosens 
 from earth. It lifts up to heaven. It makes 
 the world less fascinating. It prepares for the 
 inseparable union: the meeting-time the 
 bridal-day. 
 
 There are other figures given us of the suf- 
 fering church. But let these suffice. They 
 will help us to understand our true condition, 
 and to expect nothing else than tribulation 
 here. No strange thing is happening to us, 
 It is no strange thing that the green ears of
 
 THE TYPES. 85 
 
 corn should be dried with fire It is no strange 
 thing that the cherubim should be made of 
 beaten gold. It is no strange thing that, in the 
 absence of the bridegroom, the bride should 
 mourn
 
 : 
 
 v, 
 
 CHAPTER VII. 
 
 THE PROVING. 
 
 THERE are no beings about whom we make 
 BO many mistakes as our own selves. "The 
 heart is deceitful above all things ;" and be- 
 sides this, the " deceitfulness of sin " is un- 
 searchable. So that when the deceitfulness of 
 our heart and the deceitfulness of sin come 
 together, we need not wonder that the effect 
 should be ignorance of ourselves. 
 
 Besides, we are unwilling to search. We 
 shrink from the exposure which such a scru- 
 tiny would make. No doubt the consciousness 
 of being forgiven takes away much of this re- 
 luctance. We are not so unwilling to know 
 the worst, when we are assured that however 
 hideous the pollution thus dragged to light, it 
 can never come between us and God. For 
 with God all is peace. The blood that sprinkles 
 us has made it a simple impossibility for God 
 ever to be angry with us again. So that we 
 come to realize, in some degree, the blessedness 
 of the man whose trangression is forgiven;
 
 THE PROVING. 87 
 
 our spirit is "without guile." We have no ob- 
 ject now in concealing anything from God or 
 ourselves. We become open, frank, straight- 
 forward. Still the search is a painful one, and 
 we would rather postpone it. It might bring 
 many things to light which would shock and 
 humble us. It might alarm us with the ex- 
 tent of the evil which still remains in us, even 
 though it could not bring us into condemna- 
 tion. Hence we are slow to learn, or even to 
 inquire into, the evil that cleaves to us still. 
 
 Moreover, we are not at all persuaded that 
 there is so very much evil in us. We do not 
 know ourselves. Our convictions of sin have 
 been but shallow, and we are beginning to ima- 
 gine that the conflict between the flesh and the 
 spirit, is not so very fierce and deadly as we 
 had conceived it to be. We think we have 
 got quit of many of our sins entirely, and are 
 in a fair way for speedily getting quit of all 
 the rest. The depths of sin in us we have 
 never sounded ; the number of our abomina- 
 tions we have never thought of marking. We 
 have been sailing smoothly to the kingdom, 
 and perhaps at times were wondering how 
 our lot should be so different from the saints 
 of old.
 
 88 THE PROVING. 
 
 We thought too that we had got the better 
 of many of our corruptions. The old man 
 was crucified. It seemed dead, or at least 
 feigned itself to be so in order to deceive us. 
 Our lusts had abated. Our tempers had im- 
 proved. Our souls were calm and equable. 
 Our mountain stood strong, and we were say- 
 ing " we shall never be moved." The victory 
 over self and sin seemed, in some measure, 
 won. Alas, we were blind ! We were pro- 
 foundly ignorant of our hearts. 
 
 Well, the trial came. It swept over us like 
 a cloud of the night, or rather through us like 
 an iceblast, piercing and chilling us to the vi- 
 tals. Then the old man within us awoke, 
 and, as if in response to the uproar without, 
 a fiercer tempest broke loose within. We felt 
 as if the four winds of heaven had been let 
 loose, to strive together upon the great deep 
 within us. Unbelief arose in its former 
 strength. Rebelliousness raged in every re- 
 gion of our soul. Unsubdued passions re- 
 sumed their strength. We were utterly dis- 
 mayed at the fearful scene. But yesterday, 
 and this seemed impossible. Alas, we know 
 not the strength of sin, nor the evil of our
 
 f: 
 
 THE PROVING. 89 
 
 hearts, till God thus allowed them to break 
 loose. 
 
 !lt was thus he dealt with Israel ; and for 
 ,his end he led them into the desert. " The 
 Lord thy God led thee forty years in the wil- 
 derness to humble thee, and to prove thee, and 
 to know what was in thine heart."* Their 
 desert-trials put them to the proof. And when 
 thus proved, what iniquity was found in 
 them ! What sin came out which had lain 
 hidden and unknown before ! The trial did 
 not create the evil ; it merely brought out 
 what was there already, unnoticed and unfelt, 
 like a torpid adder. Then the heart's deep 
 fountains were broken up, and streams of pol- 
 lution came rushing out, black as hell. Re- 
 bellion, unbelief, fretfulness, atheism, idola- 
 try, self-will, self-confidence, self-pleasing, all 
 burst out when the blast of the desert met 
 them in the face, and called Egypt to remem- 
 brance with its luxurious plenty. Thus they 
 were proved. 
 
 Even so it is with the saints still. God 
 chastens them that he may draw forth the 
 evil that is lying concealed and unsuspected 
 within. The rod smites us on the tenderest 
 
 * Deut. vii. 2. 
 8*
 
 00 THE PROVING. 
 
 part, and we start up in a moment as if in 
 arms against God. The flesh, the old man, is 
 cut to the quick, and forthwith arouses itself, 
 displaying, of a sudden, much of its former 
 strength. When it was asleep we did not 
 know its power, but now that it has been wa- 
 kened up, its remains of strength appal us. 
 
 It is not till the sea is " troubled," that " its 
 waters cast up mire and dirt." When all 
 was calm, there seemed naught but purity per- 
 vading it, and ripple folded over ripple in 
 the still brightness of its transparent green. 
 But the winds break loose, the tempest stirs 
 its lowest depths, and then all is changed. 
 Thus we see it in the saints. When calamity 
 breaks over them like a tempest, then the hid- 
 den evils of their hearts awake. Sins scarcely 
 known before, display themselves. The heart 
 pours out its wickedness. Hard thoughts of 
 God arise. Atheistical murmurings break 
 out, and refuse to be restrained. Question- 
 ings both of his wisdom and of his love are 
 muttered ; yea, how often do they assume a 
 more explicit form, and we ask if God be so 
 loving and wise, why is it thus ? We could 
 not have expected such treatment at his hands. 
 Distrust and unbelief assume the mastery,
 
 THE PROVING. 91 
 
 and we refuse to acquiesce in his will. It 
 seems hard to be smitten so severely, and laid 
 so low. For a while it seems as if the heart 
 were determined to think evil thoughts of God 
 and never to think well of him again. And, 
 though a calm ensues and we become both 
 ashamed and terrified at our rebelliousness, 
 still the heart has given forth its pollution. 
 We have learned its unsearchable depths of 
 evil. We are led on the one hand into deeper 
 views of our own amazing and incredible vile- 
 ness ; and on the other into fuller discoveries 
 of the abounding grace of God. We learn to 
 prize more the open fountain, and we betake 
 ourselves anew for covering to the righteous- 
 ness of the Righteous One. 
 
 It is remarkable that when the saints of old 
 were tried and proved, there was found in 
 them not only evil, but the very evil we 
 should least of all have anticipated. We 
 should have said for instance of Noah, he is 
 one whose sobriety and self-restraint will be 
 carried with him to his grave. He stood alone 
 amid a luxurious, sensual, intoxicated world, 
 condemning their lasciviousness and revelry. 
 Yet no sooner is he placed in circumstances 
 of temptation than he falls. Noah becomes
 
 9'2 THE ROVING. 
 
 drunken ! Again Abraham stands out pre- 
 eminent for faith and courage ; yet, when he 
 goes to Egypt and Gerar, his faith gives way 
 and he utters lies through fear. Lot had 
 withstood all the sensuality and filthiuess of 
 Sodom, and his righteous soul mourned over 
 their abominations ; yet, scarce is he delivered 
 from the city's destruction, than he falls into 
 drunkenness and lust, equal to that of the 
 cities that had been consumed. Job, though 
 marked for his patience, gave way to impa- 
 tience in the day of trial. Moses, the meekest 
 of all men, displayed his auger, and " spake 
 unadvisedly with his lips." David was one 
 of the bravest that ever fought the battles of 
 the Lord in Israel, and he had gone out 
 against Goliath with a sling and a stone, yet 
 when he fled before Saul and came to king 
 Achish at Gath, his courage is gone, and he 
 feigns himself a madman through fear of his 
 enemies. Elijah had stood before kings with- 
 out trembling, to pronounce the sentence of 
 judgment, to shut up the heavens, and to 
 wield the sword of Jehovah's vengeance, 
 though alone amid tens of thousands. Yet he 
 flies before a woman's threat, he gives up all for 
 lost and requests to die. Ezekiel, whose char-
 
 THE PROVING. 93 
 
 acter shines out as one of singulai holiness 
 and obedience, yet records against himself a 
 strange instance of unsubmissiveness, when 
 sent by God on an errand of judgment to 
 Israel : " I went in bitterness, in the heat 
 (marg. hot anger) of my spirit, but the hand 
 of the Lord was strong upon me."* Peter's 
 attachment to his Lord is one of his peculiar 
 characteristics, yet it was Peter that denied 
 him. John was the disciple who seems to 
 have been likest his master in gentleness and 
 love, yet it was John who wanted to call down 
 fire from heaven upon the Samaritan village. 
 Lord, what is man ! And what is a human 
 heart? the heart, even of thy saints when 
 proved, and held up to view ! " O heart, 
 heart,"' said John Berridge of himself, " what 
 art thou '} A mass of fooleries and absurdities, 
 the vainest, wickedest, craftiest, foolishest thing 
 in nature." What deep-hidden evil, what sel- 
 fishness, what pride, what harsh tempers, what 
 worldiiness come out in a moment, wiien the 
 stroke goes deep into the soul ! How long Job 
 remained stedfast, holding fast his integrity and 
 confidence in G<~d. Stroke after stroke laid 
 him prostrate, yet he gave glory to God in the 
 * Ezek. iii. 14.
 
 94 T*TF r vr > v if.F-- 
 
 midst of desolation and sorrow. The inner 
 circle of self had net been reached. But when 
 a loathsome disease drove him to the dung- 
 hill, and his friends rose up against him, and 
 addressed him as a man marked out by God 
 as guilty, then his faith and patience gave 
 way. The very centre of his being had been 
 reached and probed ; and forth came the 
 stream of impatience and unbelief. It takes a 
 sharp arrow, and a strong-drawn bow to pierce 
 into the inmost circle ; yet God in kindness 
 spares not. The seat of the disease must be 
 reached, and its real nature brought out to the 
 light. 
 
 /~ Of all the evils which are thus drawn forth 
 from the heart of the saint ; the worst, and yet 
 the commonest, are hard thoughts of God. Yet 
 who would have expected this 1 Once, indeed, 
 
 (in our unbelieving days our souls were full of 
 these. Our thoughts of God were all evil to- 
 gether. When the Holy Spirit wrought in our 
 hearts the mighty change, the special thing 
 which he accomplished was teaching us to 
 think well of God, shewing us how little he 
 had deserved these hard thoughts from us, how 
 much he had deserved the opposite. The 
 i wondrous tale of manifold love, which the Gos-
 
 THE PROVING. 95 
 
 pel brought to us, won our hearts and made 
 us ashamed of our distrust. We said then, 
 surely we shall never think ill of God again. . 
 " Though he slay me, yet will I trust in 
 him." We thought that affliction would only 
 make us cleave to him the more. Yet scarcely 
 does he begin to smite us, than our former 
 thoughts return. We wonder why he should 
 treat us thus. We suspect his love and faith- 
 fulness. Our hold 6f his grace seems to loosen, 
 as if at times it would wholly give way. 
 
 We are like Jonah with his withered gourd. 
 We think we do well to be angry, even unto / 
 death. God does not seem the same loving 
 God as when first we believed and tasted for- 
 giveness from his gracious hands. Alas, the 
 treachery of our hearts has been at length dis- 
 covered. We find that we were not serving 
 God for naught. 
 
 May he not expostulate with us and ask us, 
 "Dost thou well to be angry?" Would not 
 this question close our lips for ever? Dost 
 thou well to be angry 01 desponding, when 
 God hath forgiven all thine iniquities and re- 
 moved them from thee, as far as the east ia 
 from the west? Dost thou well to be angry 
 wheu thou art delivered from the wrath to
 
 96 THE PROVING. 
 
 come, as well as from a present evil world, and 
 safely lodged within the clefts of the rock with 
 Jesus thy companion there ? Dost thou well 
 to be angry when the Father's love is t hine 
 assured portion, and the kingdom of the Son 
 thine inheritance for ever ? Dost thou well to 
 be angry when the night is far spent and the 
 day is at hand, when the distant eastern clouds 
 are taking on their rosy fringes, and the day- 
 star is preparing to arise?* 
 
 * God's chastened ones will find many precious words of 
 counsel and consolation in Samuel Rutherford's letters. 
 Having been tried, he knew how to speak a word in season 
 to the weary. Hear some of them " I wonder many times 
 that ever a child of God should have a sad heart, considering 
 what the Lord is preparing for them." " When we shall 
 come home, and enter into the possession of our brother's 
 fair kingdom, and when our heads shall find the weight of 
 the eternal crown of glory, and when we shall look back to 
 pains and sufferings, then shall we see life and sorrow to be 
 less than one step or stride from a prison to a glory, and that 
 our little inch of time-suffering is not worthy of our first 
 night's welcome home to heaven." "However matters go, 
 the worst shall be a tired traveller, and a joyful and sweet 
 welcome home,'-
 
 CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 THE REBUKING. 
 
 IT is worth while noticing the word which 
 is used in the two well-known passages which 
 speak of chastisement, "Neither faint when 
 thou art rebuked of him."* " As many as 1 
 love, I rebuke and chasten. "t A little inquiry 
 into its meaning, and a little comparing of 
 texts will help to set it in its true light. 
 
 It is the same word used in Matt, xviii. 15 : 
 " If thy brother trespass against thee, go and 
 tell him his fault." It is the same word used 
 in Luke iii. 19, when John is said to have re- 
 proved Herod. It is the same word used in 
 John xvi. 8, " When He cometh, He will re- 
 prove the world of sin." We learn, then, from 
 these expressions, that rebuke is not simply 
 some stern word or frown, implying displeasure 
 on the part of God, but such a frown as " tells 
 us our faults " such a frown as reproves or 
 convinces us of sin. It is God's way of point- 
 ing out what he sees to be amiss in us, of call- 
 
 * Heb iii. 5. f R GV - & W- 
 
 9
 
 98 THE REBUKING. 
 
 ing our attention to it as a thing which dis- 
 pleases him, and. on account of which, if not 
 put away, he must certainly deal with us in 
 chastisement. 
 
 The word rebuke seems to imply something 
 more gentle than chastisement. And it is of 
 some importance to consider it in this light. I 
 know not a better illustration of it than Christ's 
 address to the churches of Asia. The especial 
 preciousness of these lies in this, that they 
 show us what the heart of Christ is when re- 
 proving. What a discovery do they give us of 
 this ! Let us hear him addressing them. Thus 
 he rebukes the angel of the church of Ephe- 
 sus : " Nevertheless, I have somewhat against 
 thee, because thou hast left thy first love ; re- 
 member, therefore, from whence thou art fallen, 
 and repent." Thus he rebukes the church of 
 Pergamos : " I have a few things against thee, 
 because thou hast there them that hold the 
 doctrine of Balaam ; repent, or else I will come 
 unto thee quickly, and will fight against thee 
 with the sword of my mouth." In like man- 
 ner we might qucte his other rebukes to the 
 other churches as illustrations of our meaning. 
 But these are enough. They show the gen- 
 tleness of the reprover both in the manner and
 
 THE REBUKING. 99 
 
 the language. They aie faithful, indeed, but 
 how delicate, how tender, how mild ! They 
 point out what is amiss with all distinctness 
 and directness, yet in a manner the most fitted 
 to win, and in language the least likely to 
 offend. He begins each of them by making 
 most gracious mention of the past services and 
 excellent deeds of the angel of the church, as 
 if desirous to show how willing he was to 
 praise, in so far as he could, and how unwilling 
 to blame, save when it could not be avoided. 
 In listening to this voice speaking from hea- 
 ven, we seem to hear the same meek and 
 lowly one that once spake on earth, in the 
 house of Simon the Pharisee. Wishing to re- 
 prove him for his evil thoughts of the woman 
 who stood behind the Lord, and washed his 
 feet with her tears, he began thus mildly hig 
 rebuke, " Simon, I have somewhat to say unto 
 thee." 
 
 Yet while the rebuke of God is thus mild 
 and loving, it is both faithful and solemn. It 
 is faithful, for it hides nothing from us. Its 
 tone is soft, yet the words are full of meaning. 
 They are quite explicit in their condemnation 
 of the sin perceived in us. And the rebuke 
 of Jehovah is a solemn thing. It is not the
 
 100 THE REBUKINS. 
 
 rebuke of wrath, for that has passed awajj 
 yet it makes us stand in awe. The rebuke 
 of love is as solemn a thing as the rebuke of 
 wrath. A parent's rebuke is much to a loving 
 child, how much more is the rebuke of our 
 God the God who made heaven and earth. 
 
 Many are the rebukes which he adminis- 
 ters. Some of them are lighter and others 
 heavier. Yet in both he is laying his finger 
 upon sin, and intimating distinctly his desire 
 that we should turn from it. To the former 
 kind I fear, we oftentimes give but little heed. 
 The touch of transient pain, a brief illness, a 
 slight indisposition, a passing weakness, some 
 common domestic vexation, some trivial casu- 
 alty, some few days parting from one we love, 
 some unkind word where least we looked for 
 it, some disappointment or annoyance, these 
 are all fatherly rebukes of the lighter and 
 more gentle kind. They are not so sharp as 
 many others, yet they are not the less on that 
 account the indications of a father's will. 
 They are apt to be overlooked, for they are 
 slighter and commoner than many, and do 
 not force themselves upon our notice. Yet 
 surely it is worth our while to point them out,
 
 THE I.EBUKING. 101 
 
 and to make them the subject of special and 
 prolonged consideration. 
 
 f It is difficult to understand why we should 
 so much undervalue them. To one who 
 weighs them aright, they cannot but seem 
 peculiarly precious and affecting. Their fre 
 quency makes us familiar with them, and on 
 this account we slight them. Sad and 
 strange ! Does not their frequency show the 
 unwearied pains that God is taking with us, 
 giving us precept upon precept, line upon 
 line ? Should that very thing in them which 
 displays God's untiring earnestness, his assidu- 
 ous vigilance and intense anxiety for our 
 welfare, tempt us to disregard such dealings ? 
 Their mildness, also, as well as their fre- 
 quency, tends to make us undervalue them. 
 Unaccountable perversity ! They are so slight 
 and so gentle ; therefore, they are not to be 
 owned as the laying on of a father's hand ! 
 Had they been sharper and heavier they would 
 have been recognized as such, but being so 
 tender they are hardly worthy of our serious 
 notice ! 
 
 On this point I am persuaded, an admoni- 
 tion is much needed, not merely by a heedless 
 world, but even by the saints of God. The 
 9*
 
 102 THE REBUKING. 
 
 point adverted to is a much neglected one, 
 and yet it is one which every day's events 
 press upon our notice. A raging fever pros- 
 trates us. Our strength gives way. Our life 
 is despaired of, Then we say, this is the 
 finger of God. This is his rebuke. But we 
 take a slight cold, or sustain some slight 
 injury, there is no danger, and perhaps no 
 piercing pain ; then, alas ! we do not own the 
 doing of God ; or, at the most, we own it 
 vaguely and carelessly. The gentleness of 
 the infliction makes us feel at liberty to under- 
 value it, and to forget it as coming from God. 
 Ah ! it is thus that we " despise his chas- 
 tenings." 
 
 And what is the consequence ? We draw 
 upon ourselves severer chastisement. We 
 provoke God to visit us with heavier blows. 
 We compel him to chastise by our heedless- 
 ness of his rebuke. We make bitter trial 
 absolutely necessary. 
 
 Let us never forget this. It is our own 
 frowardness and negligence that impose a 
 necessity for the infliction of suffering. Afflic- 
 tion is not a desirable thing in itself. It 
 would be better could it be avoided. God 
 afflicts not willingly. But we constrain him.
 
 THE REBUKING. 103 
 
 Many a sorrow we might escape were we not 
 so heedless and unbelieving. 
 
 Most slowly and reluctantly does God 
 stretch out his hand to chasten. For a while 
 he wounds most slightly and mildly. If we 
 may speak after the manner of men, he just 
 hints or whispers his reproof. He is most 
 unwilling to employ sharpness. He tarries 
 long. He lingers on his way to smite. He 
 tries other means. He sends milder trials 
 first, that we may be led to self-searching and 
 repentance, and that he may be spared the 
 necessity of inflicting a heavier blow. But 
 we trifle with these ; and then, at last, he lifts 
 up his voice and speaks in a way which can 
 neither be overlooked nor mistaken. How 
 sad that we should thus so stubbornly persist 
 in filling the cup of sorrow which God would x 
 fain have spared us ! 
 
 Let us open our ears to the rebuke of God. 
 His " still small voice" should be as effectual 
 as the lightning or the earthquake. Let us 
 learn the meaning and use of slighter trials, 
 Let us count no touch of pain or grief, how- 
 ever mild or transient, too insignificant for our 
 most serious thought. This would save us 
 much It would teach us many a blessed
 
 104 THE REBUKING. 
 
 lesson in an easy, pleasant way. Every 
 trouble, however light, comes fragrant with 
 blessing. Shall we then overlook it or thrust 
 it away ? It is a new opportunity of getting 
 nearer God, and learning more of his love. 
 How foolish, how sinful, to disregard it ! God 
 is saying to us, improve this light cross, and 
 you will not need a heavier. But we are 
 deaf. And, oh, how much this deafness 
 costs us ! 
 
 It is not, however, our deafness, under light 
 troubles only, that draws on us the heavier. 
 We are too heedless even of these heavier 
 ones, and this prepares for us heavier still. 
 The easy way in which some get over 
 trials is very sad. There is a vehement out- 
 burst ,pf feeling at the moment ; and occa- 
 sionally there may be < a recurrence of this for 
 some time after the calamity has spent itself, 
 but, with the exception of such fits of grief, 
 there is nothing like laying the trial to heart. 
 To lay a visitation solemnly to heart, is some- 
 thing very different from indulging in wild 
 bursts of grief. Hence it will generally be 
 found that those who give way to these, are 
 often, during the intervals between them, very 
 easy and mirthful. This unequal pressure of
 
 THE REBUKING. 105 
 
 trial is not only in itself injurious to the soul, 
 but it neutralizes the right influence of trial, 
 and thus renders necessary another and more 
 stunning blow. 
 
 Hence it is that we so often observe, that 
 when God takes up a case in earnest, if any 
 one may so speak, it is either by a succession 
 of strokes, following each other closely, or else 
 by a long-protracted sorrow. And it is we who 
 "procure these things unto ourselves, in that 
 we have forsaken the Lord our God, whom he 
 led by the way."* Billow after billow breaks ,, 
 over us, but we ourselves have called forth the ) 
 storm ; and it is our perversity that is keeping 
 it awake ; nay, perhaps, raising the surges \ 
 higher, till we are well nigh overwhelmed. / 
 Had we but yielded to God at once, and 
 allowed him to bless us as he desired, one 
 wave might have been enough, and ere even- 
 ing the storm-breeze might have died away. 
 
 Yet still, even in this there is consolation. 
 Our foolishness is making our voyage a rough 
 one, but it is homeward still. All these many 
 blasts and billows are towards Canaan, not 
 away from it, and sometimes, from their top- 
 most crest, we get a brighter glimpse of our 
 * Jerem. ii. 17.
 
 106 THE KE"r:r TV ':-. 
 
 eternal heritage, than from the level calm of 
 more unruffled days. It brightens the black- 
 ness of the tempest, and disarms it of many a 
 terror, to know that each blast, however fierce, 
 is bearing us homeward, that each billow, 
 however rough, is carrying us more swiftly to 
 our desired haven.
 
 CHAPTER IX. 
 
 THE PURIFYING. 
 
 CHASTISEMENT supposes SIN. Suffering 
 does not, for Jesus suffered, nay, "learned 
 obedience by the things which he suffered." 
 But chastisement does. Some have, indeed, 
 applied the word chastisement to Jesus also, 
 for he was " made perfect through suffering ; n 
 and in the sense of passing through discipline, 
 that he might know by experience our condi- 
 tion here, and be seen as the doer of the Fa- 
 ther's will, the man that " pleased not himself," 
 in this sense his sorrows might be called by 
 that name. Yet in no other. For although 
 tempted in all points like as we are, it was 
 without sin. But in our case it is altogether 
 different. It is sin in us that draws down the 
 infliction, just as the rod attracts the lightning 
 from the clouds. 
 
 Yet it is all forgiven sin. In looking to the 
 cross we found forgiveness. As believers in 
 Jesus, we " have no more conscience of sin." 
 Still the flesh remains. The old man is ever
 
 108 THE PURIFYING. 
 
 at work within us. " Iniquities prevail against 
 us ;" and though we know that they are purged 
 away, still they cleave to us. Our nature is 
 still denied, though our conscience has been 
 cleansed. It is against sin, as still existing 
 within us, though forgiven, that chastisement 
 is directed. 
 
 The casting of gold or silver into the furnace 
 implies that there is dross upon them that re- 
 quires to be purged out with fire. Were there 
 no dross, there would be no need for furnace 
 or fire, or refiner's labor. These are but means 
 for getting quit of the dross. The fire which 
 the Lord is to kindle in the earth, when he 
 comes again, proves that sin is found upon it. 
 Were there no curse lying on the earth, no 
 purifying fire would be needed. But the blight 
 must be burned out, the trail of the serpent 
 must be swept clean away ; and therefore 
 the earth must be cast into the furnace, that 
 out of it may come a new and more glorious 
 creation, fit for God to look upon, and for holy 
 men to dwell in, and from which, therefore, 
 very trace of corruption must be totally erased. 
 
 So with chastisement. It has reference to 
 sin. Were it not for sin, chastisement would 
 oe unknown. In heaven there is no chastise-
 
 THE PURIFYING. 109 
 
 ment, for there is no sin. Angels know nothing 
 of it, for they know no sin. They see it afar 
 off. They hear the sad story of earth. They 
 witness the tribulations of the church, but that 
 is all. For it is only where there is sin that 
 there is chastisement. Its existence here is 
 just God's voice, saying, " I have found iniquity 
 upon the earth." Its infliction on an individual 
 is God saying, " I have seen sin on thee." I 
 do not take up the question as to particular 
 trials being the result of particular sins in in- 
 dividuals. In many cases we know that this 
 is the case. In others it is more doubtful. 
 And hence, though it is well in affliction to ask 
 what special sin or sins God is pointing at, it 
 is wrong in us to fix exclusively upon one or 
 two, instead of turning our attention to the 
 whole body of sin, and directing our efforts 
 against that. 
 
 But chastisement supposes also a determi- 
 nation on the part of God to get quit of sin. It 
 is the expression of his hatred to it, and of his 
 settled purpose to deliver from it. To purify 
 us is what he seeks ; and this he is resolved to 
 accomplish at whatever cost. It must be done, 
 for he cannot look upon iniquity. And what 
 is pain if it expel sin ? What is sorrow, if it 
 10
 
 110 THE PURIFYING. 
 
 help to purge away the evil of our nature a 
 lifetime's accumulated dross. 
 
 There are several figures which God em- 
 ploys for pointing out his designs in chas- 
 tising us. Let us enumerate these. 
 
 1. It is a refining. The saints are " cho- 
 sen in the furnace of affliction,"* and " when 
 they are tried they come forth as gold."t 
 The heat of the furnace burns out the dross 
 and leaves the pure metal behind. It is iu 
 the furnace that the flesh is destroyed and the 
 old man gets his death-stroke. It is in the 
 furnace that self-confidence is uptorn, unbelief 
 is broken, and faith is strengthened, and puri- 
 fied. Were it not for the furnace, what 
 would become of our dross and alloy ? And 
 then when the silver is in the crucible the 
 refiner himself comes near. Hear how the 
 Lord hath spoken concerning this ? " Thus 
 saith the Lord of Hosts, behold I will melt 
 them and try them, for how shall I do for the 
 daughter of my people."! " I will turn my 
 hand upon thee, and purely purge away thy 
 dross, and take away all thy tin." " When 
 the Lord shall have purged the blood of Jeru- 
 
 Is. xhriii. 10. t Job xxiii. 10. j Jer. ix. 7. Is. i. 25.
 
 THE PURIF5TING. Ill 
 
 ealem from the midst thereof by the Spirit of 
 judgment and by the Spirit of burning."* 
 
 2. It is a sifting 1 . " Lo, I will command, 
 and I will sift the house of Israel among all 
 nations like as corn is sifted in a sieve. "t 
 We are God's corn, grown in his fields and 
 gathered in by his hand. Yet we are coarse 
 and rough grain. Many a sifting process 
 must we pass through, in order to separate 
 the coarser particles, that nothing but the 
 finest may remain. Affliction sifts us. Per- 
 secution sifts us. God has many a sieve, 
 some finer and some coarser, and he makes 
 us to pass through them according as we re- 
 quire. He sifts the professing church, and 
 many fall off. He applies a finer sieve, and 
 many more fall off. He takes each church 
 by itself, each congregation by itself, and sifts 
 them, and many false brethren are discovered. 
 He takes each believer and sifts him indi 
 vidually and his coarser particles pass off. 
 This process is repeated. He is winnowed 
 and sifted again and again till the grain is ' 
 purified. 
 
 3. It is a pruning. " Every branch that 
 heareth fruit he purgeth it, that it may bring 
 
 * Is. iv. 4. r Amos ix. 9.
 
 112 THE PURIFYING 
 
 forth more fruit."* We are the branches of 
 the vine. Christ is the Father's vine ; the 
 stem and root of all spiritual life. Over this 
 precious vine the Father watches. His desire 
 is that " the branch of the Lord should be 
 beautiful and glorious ;" that this vine should 
 yield its fruit in its season. Hence he not 
 only waters it, but keeps it night and day. 
 And he prunes it with the skill and care of 
 a husbandman. He wishes to make each 
 branch fruitful as well as comely, and he 
 spares no pains : for " herein is He glorified if 
 we bear much fruit." How much we owe to 
 this heavenly pruning ! What rank, luxu- 
 riant branches does it cut away ! What 
 earthliness, what foolishness, what wayward- 
 ness, what hastiness, what fleshly lusts, what 
 selfish narrowness, are all, one by one, skill- 
 fully pruned away by the vine-dresser's care- 
 ful knife. 
 
 4. It is a polishing. We are "living 
 stones," placed one by one, upon the great 
 foundation stone laid in Zion, for the heavenly 
 temple. These stones must first be quarried 
 out of the mass. This the Holy Spirit does 
 at conversion. Then, when cut out, the 
 
 * John iv. 2.
 
 THE PURIFYING. 113 
 
 hewing and squaring begin. And God uses 
 affliction as his hammer and chisel for accom- 
 plishing this. Many a stroke is needed : and 
 after being thus hewn into shape, the polish- .. 
 ing goes on. All roughness must be smoothed 
 away. The stone must be turned round and 
 round on every side, that no part of it may ) 
 be left unpolished. 
 
 The temple indeed is above, and we are , 
 below. But this is God's design. As the 
 stones of Solomon's temple were all to be 
 prepared at a distance, and then brought to 
 Jerusalem, there to be builded together, so the 
 living stones of the heavenly temple are all 
 made ready here, to be fitted in without the 
 noise of an axe or hammer, to the glorious 
 building not made with hands. Every one 
 then must be polished here : and whilst there 
 are many ways for doing this, the most effec 
 tual is suffering. And this is God's design in 
 chastisement. This is what the Holy Spirit 
 effects : as like a workman, he stands over 
 each stone, touching and retouching it, turn- 
 ing it on every side, marking its blemishes 
 and roughness, and then applying his tools to 
 effect the desired shape and polish. Some 
 parts of the stone are so rugged and hard, ) 
 10*
 
 114 THE PURIFYING. 
 
 that nothing save heavy and repeated strokes 
 and touches will smooth them down. They 
 resist every milder treatment. And yet, in 
 patient love, this heavenly workman carries 
 on the Father's purpose concerning us. Keep- 
 ing beside him, if one may thus speak after 
 the manner of men, the perfect model accord- 
 ing to which the stone is to be fashioned, 
 even Jesus, the Father's chosen one, he 
 labors till every part is shaped according to 
 his likeness, line after line. No pains are 
 spared, no watchfulness relaxed, till we are 
 made entirely like him, being changed into 
 the same image from glory to glory by the 
 Spirit of the Lord. 
 
 Thus affliction moulds and purifies. Thus 
 it effaces the resemblance of the first Adam, 
 and traces in us each lineament of the second, 
 that " as we have borne the image of the 
 earthly, we may also bear the image of the 
 heavenly." " Oh," said a saint of other days, 
 " what I owe to the file, to the hammer, to the 
 furnace of my Lord Jesus !" 
 
 Come, then, let us question ourselves and 
 endeavor to ascertain what affliction has been 
 doing for us, and what progress we are making 
 in putting off the old man and in putting on
 
 THE PURIFYING. 115 
 
 the new. Am I losing my worldliness of spirit, 
 an I becoming heavenly-minded? Am I get- 
 ting quit of my pride, my passion, my stub- 
 bornness, and becoming humble, mild, and 
 teachable ? Are all rny idols displaced and 
 broken, and my creature comforts do I use as 
 though I used them not ? Am I caring less for 
 the honors of time, for man's love, man's smile, 
 man's applause? Am I crucified to the world, 
 and is the world crucified to me, by the cross 
 of Christ ; or am I still ashamed of his reproach, 
 and half-reluctant to follow him through bad 
 report and through good, through honor and 
 through shame ? Do I count it my glory and 
 my joy to walk where he has led the way, to 
 suffer wherein he suffered, to drink of the cup 
 of which he drank, and to be baptized with the 
 baptism wherewith he was baptized? Or 3 
 while professing to seek the kingdom hereafter, 
 do I refuse to undergo that tribulation through 
 which it must be entered ; whilst willing to 
 secure the crown of glory, do I shrink back 
 from the crown of thorns ? Am I every day 
 becoming more and more unlike the children 
 of earth, more and more fashioned after the 
 likeness, and bearing the special lineaments of 
 my Elder Brother, of whom the whole family
 
 116 THE PURIFYING. 
 
 in heaven and earth is named ? Do I realize 
 this earth as neither my portion nor my rest, 
 and, knowing that one chain may bind me as 
 fast to the world as a thousand, am I careful 
 to shake off every fetter that may bind me to 
 ( the vanities of a world like this ? Is chastise- 
 ment really purifying me ? Am I conscious of 
 its blessed effects upon my soul ? Can I look 
 back upon such and such scenes of trial and 
 say, " there and then I learnt most precious 
 lessons ; there and then I got rid of some of the 
 body of this death ; there and then I got up to 
 a higher level, from which I am striving to 
 ascend to one higher still?" Have I learned 
 much of the sympathy of Jesus, and known 
 the blessedness of having such an one as he to 
 weep along with me in my day of sorrow? 
 Have I wiped off my rebellious tears and been 
 taught to shed only those of love arid submis- 
 sive fondness ; tears of brotherhood and sym- 
 pathy, tears of longing to be absent from the 
 body, and present with the Lord ? 
 
 To make us " partakers of his holiness," 13 
 God's great design, as stated by the apostle. 
 And there is something very remarkable about 
 the expression. It corresponds to a similar on 3 
 .'n the second epistle of Peter, " partakers of
 
 THE PURIFYING. 117 
 
 the divine nature." It implies something very 
 exalted, and very blessed ; much more so than 
 if it had merely been told us that God's aim 
 was to " make us holy." Partakers of his own 
 very holiness, his very nature ! This is more 
 than angels can glory in. It is something pe- 
 culiar to " the redeemed from among men," 
 the members of the body of Christ. And it is 
 in this way that Jesus speaks to us. It is not 
 merely " peace " that he promises to us, but his 
 own peace, " my peace." It is not merely 
 joy he bestows, but his own joy. " my joy." 
 So here it is not merely holiness he is confer- 
 ring upon us, but his own holiness. His wish 
 is to make us partakers of that. And oh ! how 
 much does that imply ! 
 
 A goodly prize this ! One for the obtaining 
 of which we may well count all things but loss. 
 It is well for us when we come to see it in all 
 its value and excellency, and to set our hearts 
 upon it. Until we do so there will be strife 
 between us and God ; for this is the blessing 
 which above all others he desires for us, and 
 which he is bent on conferring upon us. When, 
 however, we come to be perfectly at one with 
 him as to this, then the struggle ceases. He 
 gets his own way, and this is best for us. How
 
 118 THE PURIFYING. 
 
 blessed, when his desire to deliver us from sin, 
 and ours to be delivered from it, meet together; 
 when his purpose to make us holy is cordially 
 responded to by our fervent longings to be so! 
 Then it is that the Divine fulness flows into 
 the soul without a check, and, notwithstanding 
 the bitterness of the outward process by which 
 this is effected, joy unspeakable and full of 
 glory, possesses the consecrated soul. 
 
 " Wherefore, laying aside every weight, and 
 the sin which doth so easily beset us, let us 
 run with patience the race set before us, look- 
 ing unto Jesus, the author and the finisher of 
 our faith, who for the joy set before him en- 
 dured the cross, despising the shame." And 
 there is nothing like affliction for teaching us 
 this. It acts like the wind upon the trees, 
 making them take deeper root. It is the 
 mowing of the grass, that it may shoot up 
 thicker and greener. It is the shaking of the 
 torch that it may blaze the brighter.
 
 CHAPTER X. 
 
 THE AROUSING. 
 
 ( IT may have been long since the Holy Spirit 
 awoke us from our sleep of death. Into that 
 same deep sleep we know that we shall never 
 fall again. He who awoke us will keep us 
 awake until Jesus come. In that sense we 
 shall sleep no more. 
 
 But still much of our drowsiness remains. 
 We are not wholly awake, and oftentimes 
 much of our former sleep returns. Dwelling 
 on the world's enchanted ground, our eyes 
 close, our senses are bewildered, our conscience 
 loses its sensitiveness, and our faculties their 
 energy ; we fall asleep even upon our watch- 
 tower, forgetful that the night is far spent, and 
 the day is at hand. 
 
 While thus asleep, or half-asleep, all goes 
 wrong. Our movements are sluggish and life- 
 less. Our faith waxes feeble ; our love is 
 chilled ; our zeal cools down. The freshness of 
 other years is gone. Our boldness has forsaken 
 us. Our schemes are carelessly devised and
 
 120 THE AROUSING. 
 
 drowsily executed. The work of Go;! is hin- 
 dered by us instead of being helped forward. 
 We are a drag upon it. We mar it. 
 
 But God will not have it so. Neither for his 
 work's sake, nor for his saints' sake, can he 
 suffer this to continue. We must be aroused 
 at whatsoever cost. We are not to be allowed 
 to sleep as do others. We must watch and be 
 sober, for we are children of the light and of 
 the day, not of the night nor of darkness. God 
 cannot permit us thus to waste life, as if its 
 only use were to be sported with or trifled 
 away. Duties lazily and lifelessly performed : 
 half-hearted prayers ; a deportment, blameless 
 enough perhaps, but tame and unexpressive, 
 and, therefore uninfluential ; words well and 
 wisely spoken perhaps, but without depth and 
 intensity, and, therefore, without weight, 
 these are not things which God can tolerate in 
 a saint. It is either the coldness of Sardis, to 
 which he says, " If thou shall not watch, I will 
 come on thee as a thief, and thou shalt not 
 know what hour I will come upon thee." Or 
 it is the lukewarmness of Laodicea, to which 
 he says, " Because thou art lukewarm, and 
 neither cold nor hot, I will spue thee out of my 
 mouth."
 
 THE AROUSING. 121 
 
 In arousing us, God proceeds at first most 
 gently. He touches us slightly, as the angel 
 did Elijah, under the juniper tree, that he may 
 awake us. He sends some slight visitation to 
 shake us out of our security. He causes us to 
 hear some distant noise ; it may be the tumults 
 of the nations, or it may be the tidings of 
 famine, or war, or pestilence afar off. Perhaps 
 this entirely fails ; we slumber on as securely 
 as ever. Our life is as listless and as useless 
 as ever. Then he comes nearer, and makes 
 his voice to be heard in our own neighborhood. 
 or within the circle of our kindred. This also 
 fails. Then he comes nearer still, for the time 
 is hurrying on, and the saint is still asleep. He 
 speaks into our very ears. He smites upon 
 some tender part, till every fibre of our frame 
 quivers, and every pulse throbs quicker. Our 
 very soul is stricken through, as with a thou- 
 sand arrows. Then we start up like one 
 awakening out of a long sleep, and, looking 
 round U3, wonder how we could have slept so 
 long. 
 
 But oh, how difficult it is thoroughly to 
 
 awaken us ! It needs stroke upon stroke in 
 
 long succession to do this. For after every 
 
 waking up, there is the continual tendency to 
 
 11
 
 122 THE AROUSING. 
 
 fall back again into slumber. So that we need 
 both to be made awake, and to be kept awake. 
 What, sorrows does our drowsiness cost us 
 what bleeding, broken hearts ! The luxury 
 of " ease in Zion," indulged in perhaps for 
 years, has been dearly bought. 
 
 " Think of living," was the pregnant maxim 
 of the thoughtful German. " Thy life," says 
 another, quoting the above, " wert thou the 
 pitifulest of all the sons of earth is no idle 
 dream, but a solemn reality. It is thy own. 
 It is all thou hast to confront eternity with. 
 Work then, like a STAR, unhasting yet un- 
 resting." 
 
 There are some Christians who work, but 
 they do not work like men awake. They 
 move forward in a certain track of duty, but it 
 is with weary footstep. Their motions are 
 constrained and cold. They do many good 
 things, devise many good schemes, say excel- 
 lent things, but the vigorous pulse of warm 
 life is wanting. Zeal, glowing zeal, elastic 
 and untiring, is not theirs. They neither 
 burn themselves, nor do they kindle others. 
 There is nothing of the "star" about them, 
 save its coldness. They may expect some sharp 
 stroke of chastisement, for they need it.
 
 THE AROUSING. 123 
 
 There are others who are only wakeful by 
 fits and starts. They cannot be safely counted 
 on, for their fervor depends upon the humor of 
 the moment. A naturally impulsive tempera- 
 ment, of which, perhaps, they are not suf- 
 ficiently aware, and which they have not sought 
 either to crucify or to regulate, renders them 
 uncertain in all their movements. This inter- 
 mittent wakefulness effects but little. They 
 do and they undo. They build up and they 
 pulldown. They kindle and quench the flame 
 alternately. There is nothing of the " star " 
 about them. They stand in need of some sore 
 and long-continued pressure, to equalize the 
 variable, fitful movements of their spirit. 
 
 There are others who seem to be always 
 wakeful, but then it is the wakefulness of 
 bustle and restlessness. They cannot live 
 but in the midst of stirring, and scheming, 
 and moving to and fro. Their temperament 
 is of that nervous, tremulous, impatient kind 
 that makes rest or retirement to be felt as 
 restraint and pain. These seldom effect 
 much themselves, but they are often useful, 
 by their perpetual stir and friction, for setting 
 or keeping others in motion, and preventing 
 stagnation around them. But their incessant
 
 124 THE AROUSING. 
 
 motion prevents their being filled with the 
 needed grace. Their continual contact with 
 the outward things of religion hinders their 
 inward growth, and mars their spirituality. 
 These are certainly in one sense like the 
 " star," wakeful and unresting, but they move 
 forward with such haste, that instead of 
 gathering light or giving it forth, they are 
 losing every day the little that they pos- 
 sessed. A deep sharp stroke will be needed 
 for shaking off this false fervour, and impart- 
 ing the true calm wakefulness of Spirit, to 
 which, as saints, they are called. It is the 
 deepening of spiritual feeling that is needed 
 in their case, and it takes much chastening to 
 accomplish this. 
 
 There are others who are always steadily 
 at work, and apparently with fervour too. 
 Yet a little intercourse with them shows that 
 they are not truly awake. They work so 
 much more than they pray, that they soon 
 become like vessels without oil. They are 
 further on than the last class, yet still they 
 need arousing. They are like the " star," 
 both " unresting and unhasting," yet their 
 light is dim. Its reflection upon a dark world 
 is faint and pale. It is a deeper spiritual life
 
 f 
 
 \ t 
 
 THE AROUSING. 125 
 
 and experience that they need ; and for this, 
 it may be, there is some sore visitation in 
 store for them. 
 
 The true wakeful life is different from all 
 these. It is a thing of intensity and depth. 
 It carries ever about with it the air of calm 
 and restful dignity ; of inward power and 
 greatness. It is fervent, but not feverish ; 
 energetic, but not excited ; speedy in its 
 doings, but not hasty ; prudent, but not timid 
 or selfish ; resolute and fearless, but not rash ; 
 unobtrusive and sometimes, it may be, silent, 
 yet making all around to feel its influence ; 
 full of joy and peace, yet without parade or 
 noise ; overflowing in tenderness and love, 
 yet, at the same time, faithful and true. 
 
 This is the wakeful life ! But oh, before it 
 is thoroughly attained, how much are we 
 sometimes called upon to suffer, through the 
 rebelliousness of a carnal nature, that will 
 not let us surrender ourselves up wholly to 
 God, and present ourselves as- living sacrifices, 
 which is our reasonable service. 
 
 In thus arousing us from our slumber, chas- 
 
 tisement not merely makes us more energetic, 
 
 more laborious, but it makes us far more 
 
 prayerful. Perhaps, it is here, that the 
 
 11*
 
 126 THE AROUSING. 
 
 waking up is most sensibly felt. Nothing so 
 quickens prayer as trial. It sends us, at once, 
 to our knees, and shuts the door of our closet 
 behind us. In the day of prosperity we have 
 many comforts, many refuges to resort to ; in 
 the day of sorrow we have only one, and that 
 is God. Our grief is too deep to tell to any 
 other : it is too heavy for any other to soothe. 
 Now we aw r ake to prayer. It was something 
 to us before, but now it is all. Man's arm 
 fails, and there is none but God to lean upon. 
 
 Our closets, in truth, are the only places of 
 light in a world which has now become 
 doubly dark to us. All without and around 
 is gloom. Clouds overshadow the whole re- 
 gion. Only the closet is bright and calm. 
 How eagerly, how thankfully we betake our- 
 selves to it now. We could spend our whole 
 time in this happy island of light which God 
 has provided for us in the midst of a stormy 
 ocean. When compelled, at times, to leave 
 it, how gladly ,do we return to it ! What 
 peaceful hours of solitude we have there, with 
 God for our one companion ! We can almost 
 forget that the clouds of earth are still above 
 us, and its tempests still noting around us. 
 
 Prayer becomes a far more real thing than
 
 THE AROUSING. 127 
 
 ever. It is prized now as it was never prized 
 before. We cannot do without it. Of neces- 
 sity, as well as of choice, we must pray, and 
 send up our cries from the depths. It becomes 
 a real asking, a real pleading. It is no form 
 now. What new life, new energy, new ear- 
 nestness are poured into each petition ! It is 
 the heart that is now speaking, and the lips 
 cannot find words wherewith to give utterance 
 to its desires. The groanings that " cannot 
 be uttered" are all that now burst forth and 
 ascend up into the ear of God. Formerly, 
 there Avas often the lip without the heart ; 
 now it is far oftener the heart without the lip. 
 Now we know how " the Spirit helpeth our 
 infirmities." We begin to feel what it is to 
 " pray in the Holy Ghost." 
 . There is a new nearness to God. Com- 
 munion with him is far more of a conscious 
 reality now. It is close dealing with a living 
 personal Jehovah. New arguments suggest 
 themselves ; new desires spring up ; new 
 wants disclose themselves. Our own empti- 
 ness and God's manifold fulness are brought 
 before us so vividly that the longings of our 
 inmost souls are kindled, and our heart crieth 
 out for God, for the living God. It was
 
 128 THE AROUSING. 
 
 David's sorrows that quickened prayer in him. 
 It was in the belly of the whale that Jonah 
 was taught to cry aloud. And it was among 
 the thorns of the wilderness and (he fetters of 
 Babylon that Manasseh learnt to pray. 
 
 Church of Christ, chosen heritage of the 
 Lord, awake ! Children of the light and of 
 the day, arise ! The long winter night is 
 nearly over. The day-star is preparing to 
 ascend. " The end of all things is at hand, 
 /" be ye therefore sober and watch unto prayer."* 
 " Why sleep ye ? Rise and pray, lest ye 
 ^\ enter into temptation !"t 
 
 * 1 Peter iv. 7. 4 Luke xxii. 4fi.
 
 CHAPTER XI. 
 
 THE SOLEMNIZING. 
 
 LAUGHTER and gaiety belong to a fallen 
 world. They are too superficial to have 
 place among the holy ; and too hollow to be 
 known among the truly happy. With the 
 peace of God in our hearts we feel that we 
 do not need them. They may do for child- 
 hood ; they may do for the world ; but not 
 for us. They do not suit our feelings ; they 
 are not deep nor solid enough to be in har- 
 mony with our new nature. They are not 
 the utterances of a truly happy soul. 
 
 Yet we live in a gay world that rings 
 everywhere with hollow laughter. Around 
 us are the sights and sounds of mirth, by 
 which vain men are seeking to cheat away 
 their ever-fretting uneasiness, to soothe their 
 ruffled consciences, or to drown their bitterer 
 sorrows. Oftentimes the saints seem to catch 
 the tone of levity, making mirth with the 
 most mirthful, jesting with the most foolish, 
 singing, perhaps, the world's songs of vanity,
 
 130 THE SOLEMNIZING. 
 
 speaking its idle words, walking in its vain 
 paths as if its friendships and pleasures were 
 not forbidden things. 
 
 Apart, however, from the contagion of the 
 world's influence, our tone is apt to fall low 
 and our deportment to lose that solidity and 
 seriousness which become the saints. Almost 
 unconsciously and without knowing how, we 
 get light and airy ; we give way to the cur- 
 rent of vain thoughts ; we forget to set a 
 guard upon our lips ; we indulge in foolish 
 talking and jesting in our meetings with each 
 other. Our words are not "with grace, sea- 
 soned with salt." We forget the admonition, 
 " let no corrupt communication proceed out of 
 your mouths, but that which is good to the 
 use of edifying, that it may minister grace to 
 the hearers." 
 
 This propensity grows upon us. Serious- 
 ness becomes a thing reserved entirely for 
 (he closet or the sanctuary. We forget our 
 character as saints, called out of darkness and 
 " delivered from a present evil world." We 
 lose sight of our heavenly parentage and di- 
 vine adoption. Our whole habits of thought, 
 feeling, speaking and doing, too much resem- 
 ble the flippancy of a heedless 3 light-hearted
 
 THE SOLEMNIZING. 131 
 
 world, whose maxim is, "let us eat, drink, 
 and be merry." 
 
 Thus our spirituality decays. Heavenly- 
 mindedness is gone. We become of the earth, 
 earthly. Our souls cleave to the dust, and 
 we are content to grovel there. We become 
 lean and barren, neither growing ourselves 
 nor helping the growth of others. Our blos- 
 soms send forth no fragrance, our branches 
 bear no fruit. 
 
 > We grieve the Holy Spirit of God whereby 
 i we are sealed unto the day of redemption. 
 i He cannot dwell with levity and mirth any 
 more than amid profanity and crime. He 
 i retires from the temple into which he had 
 J come, and in which he would fain make his 
 \ abode forever, driven out from it by the laugh- 
 
 * ter and jesting with which we were making 
 its consecrated walls to resound. How can 
 , he dwell in a temple which, from being a 
 
 house of God and a house of prayer, we have 
 turned into a place of merchandize, a hall of 
 
 - revelry, a haunt of mirth and song ? 
 
 I do not mean, as I have said before, that 
 the saint is ever to be gloomy. No. Gloom 
 and melancholy are not our portion. " The 
 lines have fallen unto us in pleasant places."
 
 132 THE SOLEMNIZING. 
 
 They are not the inmates of a soul that has 
 tasted the joy of pardon and is walking in 
 light, as a happy child with a loving father. 
 But true joy is a serious thing. Its fountains 
 are deep. It is the waking up of the heart's 
 deep springs. Mirth and levity are not joy. 
 They are too shallow to deserve the name. * 
 Like the sun-flash on a stagnant pool, they 
 are a mere surface gleam of light. There is 
 nothing in them of the calm radiance, illumi- 
 nating the ocean depths, many a fathom 
 down, as if the waters themselves were a 
 mass of solid sunshine, and remaining amid 
 the heaving of the billows, unbroken and 
 unobscured. In coming to him, who is the 
 fountain of all gladness, the saint of God bids 
 farewell to gloom. Tribulation he may have, 
 nay, must have, but not gloom. That 
 has left him forever since the day he knew 
 the Saviour, and opened his ears to the joyful 
 sound. Peace is now his heritage. 
 
 But still it is not levity that is his portion. 
 It is joy. And this joy is not only far superior 
 to this vain mirth, but it is utterly inconsist- 
 ent with it. This levity is as much an 
 enemy to real joy as it is to holiness and 
 spirituality. Hence, it must be rooted up.
 
 THE SOLEMNIZING. 133 
 
 God cannot suffer it in his children. His 
 desire is that they should set their affections 
 on things above. This element of earthliness 
 must be purged out. They must be made 
 solemn and thoughtful. For this end, he 
 visits them with chastisement. In a moment, 
 perhaps, he smites them to the dust; or, by 
 some more slow but withering, crushing calam- 
 ity, he slays and casts out that foolishness 
 which had wrought itself into the very tex- 
 ture of their being. 
 
 His purpose is to make them thoughtful 
 and solemn. He lays on them accordingly 
 something that will make them think. The 
 blow prostrates them: and in a moment all 
 levity is put to flight. They cannot laugh and 
 jest now, when their home is desolate, and 
 their hearts are bleeding. They are withdrawn 
 from intercourse with an airy shadowy world, 
 and sent into the very inmost recesses of their 
 spiritual being, or forward to the infinite eter- 
 nity, whose vastness they had been but little 
 alive to. 
 
 Trials awaken us to a sense of our self- 
 pleasing ways, and our indifference to the con- 
 dition of the world we live in, not only as being 
 a world of sin, but thoroughly, and all over a 
 12
 
 134 THE SOLEMNIZING. 
 
 world of misery. They bring us into con- 
 tact with solid certainties, and that produces 
 thoughtfulness. Thy make us " acquainted 
 with grief," and that drives off all levity. Sor 
 _ow and levity keep no companionship. 
 
 It is through tears that truth is best seen. 
 When looked at through this medium, objects 
 assume their right proportions, and take their 
 proper level. Shadows then evaporate. Reali- 
 ties compass us about; and these make us 
 solemn. Shadows only make us light and 
 vain. They never stir the depths of our being, 
 bu t merely flit around its surface. 
 
 Thus God solemnizes his saints, and brings 
 them, in this respect, into closer sympathy with 
 the mind of Christ. All was solemnity with 
 him. There was no levity ever found on him. 
 Everything about him was serene, yet every- 
 thing was solemn. And the nearer we are 
 brought to resemble him, the more will this 
 calm, happy solemnity possess us. We shall 
 live not only wakeful but solemn lives. Our 
 whole deportment will speak the depth of the 
 serenity that dwells within. Our looks and 
 tones will all be solemn, and will of themselves 
 testify for God, and condemn the world. We 
 shall be men awake and alive ; men zealous
 
 THE SOLEMNIZING. 135 
 
 and in earnest; men who have no relish for 
 levity, because it is incompatible with the deep 
 peace which is their better portion ; and who 
 feel that they have no time for it, because 
 eternity is so near. 
 
 Yes, a near eternity rebukes and banishes 
 frivolity. Even apart from positive trial this is 
 its tendency. It is the eternal lifetime that 
 makes the lifetime of earth such a solemn 
 thing. Sever the living here from the living 
 hereafter, and man's longest being on earth is 
 little more in importance than the flutter of a 
 leaf; his death no more than the falling of a 
 blossom. But fasten on the infinite and the 
 eternal to our present existence, and every- 
 thing in life becomes mighty, momentous, 
 solemn. The briefest moment that comes and 
 goes is the meeting-place of two eternities. 
 Traversing this narrow pass, with rocks on 
 either side of infinite ascent and lost in impene- 
 trable midnight, how can we fail to be solem- 
 nized unless our eyes be closed or our reason 
 gone. 
 
 The pang that shoots through our frame and 
 makes each fibre quiver, would be quite en- 
 durable, were it but for a moment ; were it to 
 die and be buried with us in the same tomb ;
 
 136 THE SOLEMNIZING. 
 
 were there no capacity of eternal anguish in 
 our nature, or no eternity in which that capa^ 
 city must develope itself. The sting of a mo- 
 ment is a trifle, but the eternal stinging of the 
 undying worm is terrific beyond all utterance. 
 In like manner, the thrill of fresh joy which 
 makes the whole man throb with delight, 
 would scarce be worth the having or the losing, 
 were it only like the lightning, flashing out in 
 its brightness, afld then quenched for ever. But 
 a nature gifted with faculties for infinite enjoy- 
 ment, and with a whole eternity in which these 
 joyous buds shall expand themselves, turns all 
 our life into a deep and awful reality. A flower 
 that folds up its leaves, and withers down at 
 sunset, may be carelessly trodden under foot ; 
 but a star that shall roll round for ever in its 
 orbit, either effulgent in beauty, or dark in the 
 gloom of its own chaos, is an object of wonder 
 and awe. 
 
 Such is the life of man ! Not the life of one 
 man or some men, but of every man. By itself 
 it may seem a play-thing, a mere insect's life ; 
 but in connection with the everlasting future, 
 it becomes awfully real and solemn in its 
 aspect. We may be noble and famed upon 
 the earth ; or we may be poor, unlettered, hard-
 
 THE SOLEMNIZING. 137 
 
 toiling men, still our life is a vast reality. It 
 is no mere shadow, or rainbow, or vision of the 
 night, but an unconceivable reality in all its 
 parts, great or small. 
 
 Such especially is the life of the saint ! He 
 not only knows that there is an eternity, bat 
 he has seen and felt it. Each hour he is look- 
 ing out upon it like a traveller looking over a 
 dark and infinite precipice which flanks the 
 road on which lie is passing along. He not 
 only knows that there is such a thing as for- 
 giveness and eternal life ; but he has found 
 them ; he has tasted them ; his eyes have been 
 opened, and he has now come into the very 
 midst of realities. They compass him about 
 on every side. And especially as he " looks 
 for that blessed hope, even the glorious appear- 
 ing " of the Lord, he feels what a solemn life 
 he is called upon to lead, and that levity and 
 mirth as ill become him as they would have 
 done the High Priest, when standing within 
 the veil under the immediate vision of the 
 glory. 
 
 Even without the positive infliction of chas- 
 tisement, there is enough to solemnize a saint, 
 in what he sees and knows of things as they 
 are. A dying world ; a groaning creation ; a
 
 / 
 V 
 
 138 THE SOLEMNIZING. 
 
 curse-laden earth ; a divided bleeding church ; 
 an absent bridegroom ; these are, at all times, 
 enough to subdue and soften a believer's frame. 
 And thus he walks through earth, like Paul 
 after he had been in the third heaven an in- 
 habitant of another star, one who has his 
 conversation in heaven, who is too happy ever 
 to be gloomy, but too happy also ever to be 
 light or vain.
 
 CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THE WARNING. 
 
 AFFLICTION is full of warnings. It 
 many voices, and these of the most various 
 kinds. It speaks counsel, it speaks rebuke, it 
 speaks affection. But it speaks warning' too. 
 Let us hear some of its words of warning. 
 /"" 1. It says, " Love not the world, neither the 
 things that are in the world ; if any man love 
 the world, the love of the father is not in him."* 
 There is no enforcement of this warning so 
 solemn as that which affliction gives. It ex- 
 poses the world's hollowness, and says, " love 
 not." It shows us what a withering gourd its 
 beauty is, and says, " love not." It points out 
 to us its hastening doom, and says, " love not." 
 It declares the utter impossibility of loving both 
 the world and the Father, " If any man love 
 the world, the love of the Father is not in him." 
 " Know ye not that the friendship of the world 
 is enmity with God/' There can be no com- 
 panionship between God and the world. They 
 cannot dwell together under the same roof or in 
 
 the same heart. 
 
 * 1 John ii. 15.
 
 140 THE WARNING. 
 
 2. It says, " take heed and beware of covet- 
 ousness."* Riches cannot help, neither earthly 
 comfort avail us in the hour of grief. They 
 cannot dry up tears, nor reunite broken bonds. 
 They cannot heal the living, nor bring back 
 the dead. They profit not in the day of dark- 
 ness. Their vanity and emptiness cannot then 
 be hidden. " Thou fool, this night thy soul 
 shall .be required of thee, then whose shall 
 those things be which thou hast provided." It 
 is then we find that we need a " treasure in the 
 heaven that faileth not." "I counsel thee to 
 buy of ME gold tried in the fire, that thou 
 mayest be rich." 
 
 3. It says, " abstain from all appearance of 
 evil."t " Hate even the garments spotted by 
 the flesh." It is not the flesh merely that we 
 are to hate, but even its garments. Nor is it 
 the garments dyed and defiled with the flesh, 
 but even " spotted " with it. It is not merely 
 abstain from evil, but from all appearance of 
 evil. Suffering teaches us to shrink from sin, 
 even from the remotest and most indirect con- 
 nection with it. It says, "Oh. do not that 
 abominable thing which I hate." 
 
 4. It says, "grudge not one against the 
 
 * Luke xii. 15. f * Thes8 - v - 22 -
 
 THE WARNING. 1 tl 
 
 other."* Let there be no half-hearted affection 
 in the family of God. Let there be no envy, 
 no jealousy, no misunderstandings among the 
 brethren. Why should we be less than friends 
 who are both fellow-sufferers and fellow-soldiers 
 here ? Why should we, who are sharers in a 
 common danger and a common exile, bear to 
 each other ought but the sympathies of an in- 
 tense affection? Why should we not love one 
 another with a pure heart fervently? Yet 
 oftentimes it needs affliction to teach us this, to 
 remove our jealousies, and to draw us together 
 as brethren in sympathy and love. 
 
 5. It says, "Keep yourselves from idols."t J 
 If there be one remaining idol, break it in 
 pieces, and spare it not. Nothing is so fruitful 
 a cause of suffering as idolatry. Nothing so 
 forcibly displays the vanity of our idols as suf- 
 fering. It is with this whip of chords that 
 Christ scourges out of us the buyers and sellers, 
 suffering no earthly traffic to proceed in his 
 Father's house. 
 
 I give these warnings merely as specimens ; 
 a few out of many which might be adduced. 
 There is no room for citing more, though more 
 might easily be found. The two great points, 
 
 * James v. 9. 1 1 Jobu v. 21.
 
 142 THE WARNING. 
 
 against which the warnings of chastisement 
 are directed, seem to be, selfishness and world- 
 liness. To scourge these thoroughly out of ua 
 is God's design. 
 
 1. Selfishness. " All seek their own, not the 
 things that are Jesus Christ's." This was 
 Paul's complaint, not of the ungodly, but of 
 the churches of Christ. It was the selfishness 
 he saw in the saints that gave occasion to these 
 sorrowful words. 
 
 This selfishness is of various kinds, and 
 shows itself in various ways. It is selfishness 
 in reference to the things of Christ; or in re- 
 ference to the Church of Christ ; or in reference 
 to the work given us to do; or in reference to 
 the sacrifices we are called upon to undergo, 
 and the toils we are called upon to endure. It 
 would be easy to show how God's chastisements 
 are pointed against all these forms of selfish- 
 ness, aiming deadly blows at each one of them 
 from the outermost to the innermost circle. 
 But this is too large a field. We shall merely 
 take up the first, and even it we can only 
 touch upon. It is the most important of them 
 all, and stands so connected with the rest, that 
 whatever uproots it, destroys the others also. 
 
 Selfishness, in reference to the things of
 
 THE WARNING. 143 
 
 Christ, obviously springs from coldness to- 
 wards Christ himself. A preference of self to 
 Christ is its root and source Anything, there- 
 fore, that tends to obscure or keep out of view 
 the person of Christ must lead to selfishness. 
 It may be the love of the world ; it may be 
 the love of the creature ; it may be the love 
 of man's applause. There are the dark 
 bodies that eclipse the glory of a living Sa- 
 viour and nourish self. But these are not all. 
 Satan has deeper devices still. He brings in 
 religion between us and the Saviour ! Reli- 
 gious acts, ordinances, duties, are all turned 
 by him into so many instruments for exalting 
 self and lowering the Saviour. But even this 
 is not all. He has a subtler device still for 
 these last days. He is trying to make the 
 work of Christ a substitute for his person ; to 
 fix attention so much upon the one as to ex- 
 clude the other. The result of this is a tho- 
 roughly selfish and sectarian religion. I know 
 this is delicate ground, but the evil is an aug- 
 menting one and ought to be made known. 
 
 There are not a few who are so occupied 
 with truth that they forget " the True One :'" 
 so occupied with faith that they lose sight of 
 its personal object : so given to dwelling upon
 
 144 THE WARNING. 
 
 the work of Christ, that they overlook his 
 person. They seem to regard the latter sub- 
 ject as a matter if not beyond them, at least 
 one about which it will be time enough to 
 concern themselves when they see him face to 
 face. What He is seems a question of small 
 importance, provided they know that he has 
 accomplished a work by which they may 
 secure eternal life. " We are forgiven," they 
 say, " we have peace, all is well." They 
 take but little interest in the person of him 
 who has purchased these blessings. The 
 redemption is all, and the Redeemer is 
 nothing, or, at least, very little ! The suffi- 
 ciency of his work is all, the glory and excel- 
 lence of his person, nothing ! What is this 
 but selfishness ? We get all the benefit we 
 can out of the work of Christ, and then leave 
 himself alone ! And this selfishness intro- 
 duces itself everywhere into the actings and 
 thinkings of this class. We can trace it in 
 the mould of their doctrines. Their views of 
 the atonement are selfish ; being framed not 
 upon the principle of how God is to get his 
 purpose fulfilled, and his glory displayed ; but 
 simply of how a sinner is to be saved. Their 
 views of Jehovah's sovereignty and electing
 
 THE WARNING. 145 
 
 grace are selfish ; being just so many devices 
 for taking the sinner out of God's hands, and 
 placing him in his own. Their views of 
 the Spirit's work are selfish ; being just an 
 attempt to make His aid appear less abso- 
 lutely indispensable, and man's own skill and 
 strength of very considerable avail in the 
 matter of salvation. But even where those 
 selfish views of doctrine have not been 
 adopted, there is a latent tendency towards 
 selfishness among many ; which can only be 
 ascribed to their neglect of the person of 
 Christ. 
 
 But what has chastisement to do with this? 
 Much every way. Chiefly in this, that it 
 throws us more entirely for consolation and 
 strength upon the person of the Saviour. 
 Never do we feel more brought into contact 
 with a living personal Saviour than in our 
 days of sorrow. It is Jesus, Jesus alone, 
 Jesus himself, that we feel to be absolutely 
 necessary. The truth is precious ; his work 
 is precious ; but it is himself that we then 
 prize so much ; it is with himself that we 
 have chiefly to do; it is to himself that we 
 pour out our sorrows. 
 
 Thus by creating a necessity for our lean- 
 13
 
 146 THE WARNING. 
 
 ing on the person of Jesus (blessed necessity !) 
 affliction strikes at that which was the root 
 of selfishness. By bringing before us another 
 and far more glorious self, it absorbs our own 
 miserable self ; till in the person of Jesus, we 
 lose sight of our own selves altogether. 
 There is nothing that so makes us acquainted 
 with Christ himself as sorrow ; and hence, 
 there is nothing so efficacious in eradicating 
 self. It is God's cure for selfishness. It is 
 his way of making us seek not our own, but 
 the things that are Jesus Christ's. It is his 
 way of carrying us beyond truth, even to 
 " Him that is true." Truth is precious, but 
 in itself it is cold. But the glory of the 
 gospel is this, that it carries us up beyond 
 truth, to its living fountain-head. Nay, it 
 brings us into the very bosom of him who 
 came out of the Father's bosom, and has now 
 returned to it carrying with him all those 
 whom the Father hath given him, there, with 
 him to abide in happy fellowship, world with- 
 out end. 
 
 This, however, is a large subject, and these 
 are but a few hints. We cannot, however, 
 pursue them farther here. We pass on to
 
 THE WARNING. 147 
 
 notice the other evil against which the re- 
 bukes of God are directed. 
 
 2. Worldliness. We have seen that God's 
 cure for selfishness is the setting before us 
 another self, to absorb our own, in the person 
 of Jesus. We have now to see that his cure 
 for worldliness is the bringing before us 
 another world, more glorious than that which 
 he calls on us to forsake. There is no 
 thorough cure for it but this. It is want of 
 faith that makes us worldlings ; and when 
 the believing eye gets fixed on the world to 
 come, then we learn to set our affections on 
 things above. So long, however, as all here 
 is bright, we are content with them ; we 
 allow ourselves to sink down, and settle quietly 
 among the things of earth. But when God 
 unroofs our dwelling, or tears up its founda- 
 tion by an earthquake, then we are forced to 
 look upwards and seek a better and more 
 enduring portion. Many such shocks, how- 
 ever, are often needed, before our souls are 
 broken off from their cleaving to the dust. 
 
 The opposite of worldliness is heavenly- 
 mindedness or spiritual-mindedness. This, 
 the new relish which the Holy Spirit imparts 
 at conversion, in some measure produces.
 
 148 THE WARNING. 
 
 But it is feeble. It easily gives way. It ia 
 not keen enough to withstand much tempta- 
 tion. God's wish is to impart a keener relish 
 for the things of God, and to destroy the 
 relish for the things of time. This he effects 
 by blighting all the objects in which there 
 was earthly sweetness, so that by being de- 
 prived of objects to " mind" on earth, it may 
 of necessity be led to "mind" the things 
 above. He dries up all the " nether springs" 
 of earthly joy, that we may betake ourselves 
 to the " upper springs" which can never fail. 
 
 There is much worldliness among the 
 saints. There is worldliness in their motives 
 and actings ; worldliness in their domestic life 
 and in their intercourse with society ; there is 
 worldliness in the arrangements of their house- 
 holds and in the education of their families ; 
 there is worldliness in their expenditure, so 
 much being laid out for self, so little for God ; 
 there is worldliness in their religious schemes, 
 and movements, and societies ; there is world- 
 liness in their reading, and in their conversa- 
 tion ; there is, in short, too much of the spirit 
 of earnest worldliness about their whole de- 
 portment, and little of calm, happy superiority 
 to the things of earth. They are fretted, dis-
 
 THE WARNING. 149 
 
 tirbed, bustled just like the world. They 
 grudge labor, or fatigue, or expense, or annoy- 
 ance, in the cause of Christ, or in serving 
 their fellow-men. They have much of earth, 
 little of heaven about them. They are not 
 large-hearted, open-handed, willing to spend 
 and be spent, unmoved and unruffled, as those 
 whose eye is ever set on the incorruptible 
 inheritance on which they so soon shall enter. 
 They are low and unaspiring in the things 
 of God. 
 
 Perhaps there are few things against which 
 we require to be more warned than against this 
 spirit of worldliness. The church is very prone 
 to forget her pilgrim character in this present 
 evil world, and to live as a citizen of earth. 
 Her dignity as the eternally chosen of the Fa- 
 ther, is lost sight of ; her hope as the inheritor 
 of the glory and the kingdom of the Son is ob- 
 scured. And oh, how much of sorrow she is 
 preparing for herself, by thus losing sight of her 
 calling ! What desolation may be even now 
 hovering over the tabernacle of many a saint, 
 because they will not come out and be sepa- 
 rate, because they refuse to be " strangers on 
 the earth as all their fathers were." Sad it is, 
 13*
 
 150 THE WARNING. 
 
 indeed, that we should need affliction to teach 
 us this ! 
 
 Why should we whose home, whose treasure 
 are above, ever again seek our home 01 vur 
 treasure here 1 Why should we stoop from our 
 heavenly elevation to mingle again with the 
 company which we have forsaken ? Have we 
 repented of our choice ? Are we ashamed of 
 our pilgrim-staff, and our pilgrim- weeds ? 
 Surely not. Oh, if to be a stranger on earth be 
 to be divided from sin and sinful appetites, 
 from the seducing vanities and worthless mock- 
 eries of the world, from the fascinating beauty 
 and perilous splendor of this decaying scene : 
 if to be a stranger on earth be to be a friend of 
 God, a member of the heavenly household, an 
 expectant of the kingdom, an heir apparent of 
 the crown of glory, who would not be a 
 stranger here ? 
 
 What higher honor would we seek than to 
 share the homelessness of Jesus, the homeless- 
 ness of the church from the beginning ? Why 
 should we seek to enter into nearer fellowship, 
 and dearer relationship, with such a world as 
 this ? If we knew of no fairer heritage, we 
 might not be wondered at for lusting after our 
 forsaken pleasures. But we have the pleasures
 
 THE WARNING. 151 
 
 that are at God's right hand forever, and what 
 are earth's allurements to us? What to us are 
 the sights and sounds of earth, who " shall see 
 the King in his beauty," a^id hear his voice, 
 into whose lips grace is poured ? What to us 
 is the green fertility of earth, who shall enter 
 into the possession of the new earth, when " the 
 winter is past, the rain over and gone ?" What 
 to us is the gay glory of a city's wealth and 
 pomp, who shall be made citizens of the New 
 Jerusalam, where dwells the glory of God and 
 of the Lamb, whose foundations are of precious 
 stones, whose walls of jasper, whose gates of 
 pearl, whose streets and pavements of transpa- 
 rent gold? 
 
 Let us. then, "pass the time of our sojourning 
 here in fear." Let our loins be girt about, and 
 our lamps burning, and let us be as men ready 
 to go forth to meet our returning Lord. If we 
 watch not, if we reject the warning, our chas- 
 tisement will be sharp and sore. 
 
 The present seems a time of peculiar warn- 
 ing to the saints. Many are lying under the 
 rebukes of the Lord. Judgment has begun at 
 the house of God. God is dealing very closely 
 and very solemnly with his own. On many 
 a saint, at this moment, is his rod lying hea-
 
 lO/i THE WARNING. 
 
 vily. For he would fain warn and arouse them 
 ere the evil day arrive. He is dealing with 
 them as he dealt with Lot on the night before 
 the desolation of Sodom. Let the saints, then, 
 be warned. Let them be zealous and repent, 
 and do their first, works. Come out, be sepa- 
 rate, touch not the unclean thing ! Put off the 
 works of 'darkness ; put on the armor of light. 
 He is calling on them to get up to a higher 
 level in the spiritual life ; to have done with 
 wavering, indecision, and compromise. He is 
 calling on them to consider the Apostle and 
 High Priest of their profession, and walk in his 
 steps. He is calling on them to look at the 
 cloud of witnesses, and lay aside every weight, 
 especially that sin (of unbelief) which doth so 
 easily beset them, and to run with patience the 
 race set before them, " looking unto Jesus." 
 
 Church of the living God ! Be warned. 
 Please not thyself, even as Jesus pleased not 
 himself. Live for him, not for thyself; for him, 
 not for the world. Walk worthy of thy name 
 and calling ; worthy of him who bought thee 
 as his bride ; worthy of thine everlasting in- 
 heritance. 
 
 Up, too, and warn the world ! The chas- 
 tisements that are falling so thickly on thee
 
 THE WARNING. 153 
 
 are forerunners of the fiery shower that is pre- "^) 
 paring for the earth. Up, then, and warn 
 them urge and entreat them to flee from 
 gathering wrath. They have no tirrie to lose ; 
 neither hast thou. The last storm is on the 
 wing. Its dark skirts are already visible in the 
 heavens. Judgment has begun at the house 
 of God, and if so, then, what shall the end be 
 of them that obey not the gospel of God !
 
 CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THE RECOLLECTIONS. 
 
 " HE hath made his wonderful works to be 
 remembered."* Yes, they are for " everlasting 
 remembrance." They are not meant to be 
 forgotten, and, therefore, they are so made as 
 to render forgetfulness almost impossible. Still 
 we lose sight of them. They pass away " like 
 a tale that is told." 
 
 Amongst the most wonderful of God's works 
 are his chastisements. They are to be specially 
 remembered by us. In themselves they are 
 worthy of this. In their connection with us 
 still more so. None are so ineffaceable, fox 
 none are written so deep upon the heart. They 
 are entwined with all that we feared or hoped 
 in other days. They are '-graven with an 
 iron pen, and with lead in the rock for ever." 
 No pen is like that of sorrow, for writing inde- 
 libly upon the soul. 
 
 Simply as sorrow, God's dealings with us are 
 uot likely to be soon forgotten. We take 
 * Ps. cxi. 4.
 
 THE RECOLLECTIONS. 155 
 
 pleasure in recalling our tears and griefs. But 
 this is often mere selfish melancholy, brooding 
 in solitude over a strange history. Sometimes, 
 too, it is pride. We take a proud pleasure in 
 thinking that none have ever suffered as we 
 have done. Sometimes it is worldly sentiment, 
 sitting down to muse over faded blossoms, or to 
 recall the images of suns long set, or it may be 
 to contrast the decay of earth with the abiding 
 oeauty of yon unwrinkled azure. 
 
 But this is not what God desires. It is not 
 the remembrance of sorrow merely that he 
 seeks, but of sorrow as chastisement, of sor- 
 row as linked all along with his gracious deal- 
 ings towards us. The natural heart separates 
 these two things. It remembers the one but 
 forgets the other, and so frustrates God's de- 
 sign. Himself he ever presents to us ; himself 
 he strives to keep before us, not simply as con- 
 nected with all our present and all our future 
 history, but as inseparably entwined with all 
 the PAST. 
 
 It was thus that he expressed his mind to 
 Israel regarding this very thing. " Thou shalt 
 remember all the way which the Lord thy 
 God led thee these forty years in the wilder- 
 ness, to humble thee, and to prove thee, to
 
 156 THE RECOLLECTIONS. 
 
 know what was in thine heart, whether thou 
 wouldst keep his commandments or no. And 
 he humbled thee, and suffered thee to hunger, 
 and fed thee with manna, which thou knewest 
 not, neither did thy fathers know ; that he 
 might make thee know that man doth not 
 live by bread only, but by every word that 
 proceedeth out of the mouth of God doth man 
 live. Thy raiment waxed not old upon thee, 
 neither did thy foot swell these forty years. 
 Thou shall also consider in thine heart, that, 
 as -a man chasteneth his son, so the Lord thy 
 God chasteneth thee."* These recollections 
 of the wilderness he wished to write upon 
 Israel's heart forever. He evidently lays much 
 stress on this. He would not have them lose 
 the benefit of their desert-wanderings, and his 
 desert dealings. They were too precious to 
 be forgotten. Forty years close and solitary 
 intercourse with God in such various ways, 
 ought to have taught them much, both of him 
 and of themselves, which deserved everlasting 
 memory. Each name had some wondrous 
 scene attached to it ; each rock had its story 
 to tell. Their enemies and dangers ; their 
 hunger and their thirst ; the manna and the 
 * Deut viil 25.
 
 THE RECOLLECTIONS. 157 
 
 water ; the murmu rings and the thanksgiv- 
 ings ; their journeys and their encampments ; 
 their raiment that waxed not. old ; their shoes 
 that were as iron and brass ; their feet that 
 swelled not: and above all, the cloud that 
 rested over them, and the tent of Jehovah 
 that was pitched in the midst of them. These 
 were memorable scenes. And they were all 
 connected with the wilderness. Never before 
 had there been such an assemblage of won- 
 drous dealings, and never since has anything 
 like this been seen on earth. It could occur 
 but once. And that once was to furnish mat- 
 ter for remembrance to Israel, descending as a 
 precious heritage to their children, and their 
 children's children for ever. 
 
 It is thus with the saint in reference to his 
 desert days and desert trials. They must not 
 be forgotten as if they had served their pur- 
 pose. They must be ever rising before us, 
 not merely preserved in memory like the 
 manna in the ark, but brought forth to feed 
 upon every day. In this way sorrow may be 
 most profitable to us long after its bitterness 
 has passed away. It may furnish us with a 
 treasury of blessings for a lifetime. It may 
 be a mine of gold to us all our days.
 
 15S THE RECOLLECTIONS. 
 
 We are too little aware of this. We look 
 on trial too much as we do upon a passing 
 shower, which falla and then is gone. 
 Whereas, it is truly the smiting of the rock 
 and the issuing forth of a new stream, whose 
 waters are to keep us company through all 
 our days of wandering. The benefits of chas- 
 tisement should never be exhausted. They 
 should be coming forth in freshness with every 
 hour. Even when sitting calmly in the sun- 
 shine we may be drawing profit from the 
 stormy past. This is consolation to the chas- 
 tened soul ; for how often in this way will a 
 short sorrow be turned into lasting gladness. 
 And it does seem as if what is thus obtained 
 by us were a richer kind of blessing, a holier, 
 deeper joy. Oh, let us remember past trials 
 and carefully treasure them up as the choicest 
 of our earthly possessions. The saint who 
 has many of these to look back upon, has 
 some reason to glory in his inheritance.* 
 
 It is this that especially exercises that soft- 
 
 * "Truly no cross should be old to us. We should not 
 forget them, because years are come betwixt us and them, arid 
 cast them by hand as we do old clothes. We may make a 
 cross old in time new in use, and as fruitful as in the begin- 
 ning of it." /S. Rutherford.
 
 THE RECOLLECTIONS. 159 
 
 erring, mellowing influence which has been 
 often observed in affliction. During the 
 actual pressure of the sorrow there was less 
 of this. Perhaps we were so stunned and 
 stupified, as almost to be deprived of feeling. 
 Or if we did feel, still there was so much of 
 sharpness and bitterness about it that we were 
 bruised rather than softened. There was 
 such a struggle, and such confusion of spirit 
 thav we sometimes wondered if we were pro- 
 fiting ai all, and thought that the sorrow was 
 too great to be productive of benefit. 
 
 But in the retrospect all is different. " No 
 chastening for the present seemeth to be joy- 
 ous but grievous ; nevertheless, afterwards it 
 yieldeth the peaceable fruits of righteousness 
 unto them which are exercised thereby." The 
 wound has ceased to bleed, and, though it 
 will remain a scar forever, it is no longer open. 
 It is then that the mellowing process goes on, 
 and each remembrance of the past helps it 
 forward. This is less perceptible than the 
 others : we are not so directly conscious of it ; 
 but its silent influence upon our character, 
 our temper, our will, pur judgment, is wonder- 
 ful. The death-bed, the farewell, the funeral- 
 scene, the open tomb, the earth striking rudely
 
 160 THE RECOLLECTIONS. 
 
 on the coffin, the grave filled up, the turf rolled 
 on by stranger hands ; these are like swords 
 going through the very vitals. But they sad- 
 den more than they soften. It is the remem- 
 brance of these scenes, the frequent visit to 
 the closed tomb, the calm after-inquiry into 
 and meditation upon God's meaning in all 
 this ; it is these that so gently exercise a 
 whole life-time's influence upon the soul. 
 They surround us with a softening atmos- 
 phere, and the light they shed down on us is 
 the light of sunset, mellowed and shaded in 
 its passage through the clouds of evening. 
 
 In another way also these recollections are 
 precious. They teach us that God is true. 
 The trials themselves taught us this ; but 
 their remembrance teaches us this yet more. 
 And it is a lesson which even the saints need 
 much to learn. Even they need to be taught 
 how surely He is the AMEN, " the faithful and 
 the true ;" and that in all that he has spoken 
 to his church he has spoken truly. What 
 refreshing confirmations of this do we gather 
 up as we call to mind the past and see how 
 the Lord hath led us. We can add our Amen 
 every day to what Joshua declared to Israel 
 Q his death-bed. "Behold this day I am
 
 THE RECOLLECTIONS. 161 
 
 going the way of all the earth and ye know 
 in all your hearts, and in all your souls that 
 not one thing hath failed of all the good 
 things which the Lord your God spake con- 
 cerning you : all are come to pass unto you, 
 and not one thing hath failed thereof."* 
 
 Yes, "all "things work together for our 
 good," the past as well as the present. And 
 thus the stream of which we drink is a swell- 
 ing one. Innumerable tributaries are flowing 
 into it. This year it is " to the ancles." 
 Next year it' will be "to the knees." After 
 that it will rise " to the loins." And as it 
 reaches the ocean, bearing us calmly on its 
 bosom, it will be a great river " that cannot 
 be passed over." 
 
 Yet oh, how little have the saints learned to 
 prize these memorials of chastisement ; these 
 recollections of the wilderness, which are so 
 rich in instruction,, so fraught with blessing 
 and with joy ! 
 
 * Joshua xxxii. 14. 
 
 u*
 
 CHAPTER XIV. 
 
 THE CONSOLATION. 
 
 " To bring many sons unto glory," was the 
 end for which the Son of God took flesh and 
 died. This was no common, no inferior object. 
 So vast and worthy did Jehovah deem it that 
 it pleased him for the attaining of it to "make 
 the captain of our salvation perfect through 
 suffering." It was an object worthy of the 
 God " for whom are all things, and by whom 
 are all things." It was an object glorious 
 enough to render it " becoming " in him to 
 make Jesus pass through suffering and death, 
 and to justify the Father in not sparing his 
 only begotten Son.* 
 
 They for whom God has done all this must 
 be very precious in his sight. He must be 
 much in earnest indeed to bless them and to 
 take them to be with Him forever. As he so 
 delighted in Enoch that he could no longer bear 
 the separation and the distance, but took him to 
 be with Him without tasting death, and long ero 
 he had run the common race of man, so witli 
 his saints. He is making haste to bring them 
 to glory, foi the day of absence has been long. 
 * Heb. ii. 10.
 
 THE CONSOLATION. 163 
 
 The glory which he has in reserve for them 
 must be surpassing glory, for it was to bring 
 them to it that he was willing to bruise his Son 
 and to put him to grief. Eye hath not seen it; 
 ear hath not heard it ; it is far beyond what 
 we can comprehend, yet it is all reality. God 
 is not ashamed to be called our God because 
 he hath prepared for us a city. Were that 
 city not worthy of himself he would be ashamed 
 to have called himself by the name of "our 
 God." For that implies large blessings on his 
 part, and it leads to large expectations on ours, 
 expectations which he cannot disappoint. 
 
 He did not count this glory to be bought for 
 us at too dear a rate, even though the price 
 was the sufferings of His only begotten Son. 
 If, then. God thus estimated the glory to which 
 we were to be brought, shall not \ve do the 
 same ? If he thought it worth all the suffer- 
 ings of His Son, shall we not think it worth out 
 poor sufferings here ? Shall we not say, " I 
 reckon that the sufferings of this present time 
 are not worthy to be compared with the glory 
 which shall be revealed in us."* 
 
 This is consolation. It is that which most 
 naturally occurs to us, and it is both scriptural 
 and effectual. This is what is usually pre- 
 
 * Rom. viii. 18.
 
 164 THE CONSOLATION. 
 
 sented to the afflicted saint, and it is what he 
 feels to be very precious and suitable. But 
 though the most common and the most natural 
 consolation, it is by no means the only one. 
 Let us suggest a few others. 
 
 1. Jesus weeps with us. "In ALL our afflic- 
 tion he is afflicted." He knows our sorrows, 
 for he has passed through them all, and there- 
 fore he feels for us. He is touched with the 
 feeling of our griefs as well as of our infirmi- 
 ties. Man, very man, man all over, even in 
 his glory he enters most fully into the fellow- 
 ship of our burdens and sorrows, whatever these 
 may be ; for there is not one which he did not 
 taste when he "dwelt among us" here. His 
 is sympathy, deep, real, and true. It is no 
 fiction, no fancy. We do not see his tears fall- 
 ing upon us ; neither do we clasp his hand nor 
 feel the beating of his heart against ours. But 
 still his communion with us in suffering is a 
 reality. We may not understand how it can 
 be. But He understands it ; and he can make 
 us feel it, whether we can comprehend it or not. 
 
 2. We are made partakers of Christ's 
 silverings. What honor is this ! We arc 
 baptized with his baptism ; we drink of his 
 cup, we are made like him in sorrow as we 
 shall hereafter be made like him in joy ! How
 
 THE CONSOLATION. 166 
 
 soothing and sustaining ! If reproach, and 
 shame, and poverty are ours ; let us remember 
 that they were his also. If we have to go 
 down to Gethsemane, or up to the cross ; let us 
 think that he was there before us. It is when 
 keeping our eye on this that we are brought 
 somewhat to realize the feeling of the Apostle, 
 when he " rejoiced in his sufferings" for the 
 church, as "filling up that which was behind 
 (literally the leavings of Christ's sufferings) of 
 the sufferings of Christ in his flesh for his 
 body's sake, which is the church."* To be 
 treated better than Christ was, is neither what 
 a thoughtful soul could expect, nor what a 
 loving heart could desire. 
 
 3. Suffering is the family lot. This we 
 have already dwelt upon, and we recur to it 
 simply to present it more prominently as a 
 consolation. The path of sorrow is no unfre- 
 quented way. All the saints have trodden it. 
 We can. trace their foot-prints there. It is 
 comforting, nay, it is cheering to keep this in 
 mind. Were we cast fettered into some low 
 dungeon, would it not be consolation to know 
 that many a martyr had been there before us, 
 would it not be cheering to read their names 
 written with their own hand? all round the 
 * Col. i. 24.
 
 166 THE CONSOLATION. 
 
 ancient walls? Such is the solace we may 
 extract from all suffering ; for the furnace into 
 which we are cast has been consecrated by 
 many a saint already. 
 
 4. All things work together for our good. 
 Nothing is unsuitable, unseasonable, or unpro- 
 fitable. Out of all evil comes good to the 
 saints ; out of all darkness comes light ; out 
 of all sorrow comes joy. Each pang, sharp or 
 slight, is doing its work, the very work which 
 God designs, the very work which we could 
 not do without. The bed of sorrow is not only 
 like Solomon's chariot, all " paved with love ;" 
 but, like it, moves on with mighty swiftness, 
 bearing us most blessedly onwards to the in- 
 heritance of the undefiled. The forces of 
 earth, unless they all bear in one line, or 
 nearly so, tend to counteract each other, and 
 arrest the common impulse. But the forces 
 which God brings to bear upon us in affliction 
 are all directly and necessarily impulsive. 
 Come from what quarter they may, or from 
 opposite quarters all at once, they still bear us 
 successfully forward. "All things work toge- 
 ther for our good." " All things are ours." 
 
 5. There is special grace for every trial. 
 As trials bring to light the weakness that is in 
 us, so they draw out to meet that the strength
 
 THE CONSOLATION. 167 
 
 of God : new resources of strength and grace 
 which we never knew before. In affliction we 
 may be quite sure of learning something more 
 of God than we were acquainted with before : 
 for it is just in order to furnish an opportunity 
 for bringing out this, and showing it to us, that 
 he sends the trial. How little should we know 
 of him were it not for sorrow ! What fulness 
 of blessing comes out to us, what riches of love 
 are spread out before us in the dark and cloudy 
 day ! 
 
 6. Affliction is our fullest opportunity for 
 glorifying God. It is on earth that he ex- 
 pects to get glory from us, glory such as angels 
 cannot give, glory such as we shall not be able 
 to give hereafter. It is here that we are to 
 preach to angels ; it is here we are to show to 
 them what a glorious God is ours. Our whole 
 life below is given us for this. But it is espe- 
 cially in sorrow and under infirmity that God 
 looks for glory from us. What a glorifying 
 thing in the eye of men and angels, to see a 
 poor worm of the dust, a poor frail, sinful mor- 
 tal carrying on successful warfare with the 
 powers of hell without, and the strength of 
 sin within ! ( What a God-honoring thing to 
 see a struggling sorrowing child of earth 
 cleaving fast to God, calmly trusting in him, 

 
 168 THE CONSOLATION. 
 
 happy and at rest in the midst of storm and 
 and suffering ! What a spectacle for the hosts 
 of heaven ! Now, then, is the time for the 
 saints to give glory to the Lord their God. Let 
 them prize affliction, as the very time and op- 
 portunity for doing so, most of all. Let them 
 use such a season well. And oh what conso- 
 lation to think that affliction is really such a 
 season. Ah, surely it is one which an angel 
 might covet, which an archangel would gladly 
 stoop to were that possible. They can glorify 
 God much in heaven amid its glory and bless- 
 edness, but oh, not half so much as we can do 
 on earth amid suffering and shame. 
 
 7. We are getting quit of sin. Each pain 
 is a nail driven through some sin, another blow 
 inflicted on the flesh, destroying the very power 
 of sinning. As we entered on our first life, sin 
 fastened its chain upon us, and link after link 
 twined itself about us. When we commenced 
 our second and better life, these began one by 
 one to untwine themselves. Affliction un- 
 twined them faster ; and though it is not till 
 we are laid on a death-bed or till Jesus come, 
 that the last link of earth is thoroughly un- 
 twined or broken, still it is consolation to think 
 that each successive trial is helping on the 
 blessed consummation. A lifetime's sufferings
 
 THE CONSOLATION. lOJ 
 
 would not be too long or too heavy, if by 
 means of them we got rid of sin and sinful 
 ways and tempers ; and became more holy, 
 more heavenly, more conformable to the image 
 of the Lord. When first we believed in Jesus. 
 we were " delivered from a present evil world." 
 Yet this deliverance is not complete. The 
 world and we have not yet fully parted com> 
 pany with each other. And, therefore, God 
 drives affliction like a wedge between us and 
 the world ; or he sends it like a ploughshare 
 right across our most cherished hopes and 
 brightest prospects, till he thoroughly wearies 
 us of all below. " He hath made me weary," 
 said Job. Nor do we wonder at the complaint. 
 Wearisome nights were his. The " ploughers 
 ploughed upon his back," and drew many a 
 long furrow there. He might well be weary. 
 So with us. God makes us weary too ; weary 
 all over, thoroughly weary. We get weary 
 of a present evil world, weary of self, weary of 
 sin, weary of suffering, weary of this mortal 
 body, weary of these vile hearts, weary of 
 earth, weary of all but Jesus ! Of him, no 
 trial can weary us. Suffering only endears 
 him the more. Blessed suffering, that makes 
 him appear more precious, and the world moi 
 15
 
 170 THE CONSOLATION. 
 
 vile ; that brings him nearer to our hearts, and 
 thrusts the world away ! 
 
 8. We are preparing for usefulness while 
 here. We have but a few years below, and it 
 concerns us much that these should be useful 
 years. We have but one life, and it must be 
 laid out for God. But we need preparation 
 for usefulness. We need a thorough breaking 
 down ; a thorough emptying, a thorough bruis- 
 ing. God cannot trust us with success till we 
 are thus laid low. We are not fit to receive it; 
 nor would he get the glory. Therefore he sends 
 sore and heavy trials, in order to make us vessels 
 fit for the master's use. And oftentimes we see 
 that the heaviest trials are forerunners of our 
 greatest usefulness. When we are entirely pros- 
 trated and crushed, then it is safe to grant us 
 success, for God gets all the glory. And oh, 
 what wonders has God often done by bruised 
 reeds ! Yea, it is the bruised reed that is often- 
 est the instrument in his hand for working his 
 mighty signs and wonders. What consolation 
 is this ! Suffering is stripped of half its bitter- 
 ness, if it thus brings with it a double portion of 
 the Spirit, and fits for double usefulness on earth. 
 
 9. We have the Holy Spirit as our Com- 
 forter. He is mighty to comfort as well as to 
 sanctify. His name is " the Comforter." His
 
 THE CONSOLATION. 171 
 
 office is to console. And in the discharge of 
 this office he puts forth his power, not only 
 mediately and indirectly through the word, but 
 immediately and directly upon the soul, sus- 
 taining and strengthening it when fainting and 
 troubled. It is consolation unspeakable to know 
 that there is a hand, a divine and omnipotent 
 hand, laid upon our wounded spirit, not only 
 upholding it, but drying up, as it were, the very 
 springs of grief within. In the day of oppres- 
 sive sorrow, when bowed down to the dust, 
 what is it that we feel so much our need of as 
 a hand that can come into close and direct 
 contact with our souls, to lift them up and 
 strengthen them? For it is here that hu- 
 man consolation fails. Friends can say much 
 to soothe us, but they cannot lay their finger 
 upon the hidden seat of sorrow. They can 
 put their hand around the fainting body ; but 
 not around the fainting spirit. To that they 
 have only distant and indirect access. But 
 here the heavenly aid comes in. The Spirit 
 throws around us the everlasting arms, and we 
 are invincibly upheld. We cannot sink, for he 
 sustains, he comforts, he cheers. And who 
 knows so well as he, how to sustain, and com- 
 fort, and cheer? 
 
 10. The time is short. We have not a pil-
 
 172 THE CONSOLATION. 
 
 grimage like Seth's or Noah's, or even like 
 Abraham's, to pass through. Ours is but a 
 hand-breadth in comparison with theirs. We 
 have not many days to suffer, nor many nights 
 to watch, even though our whole life were rilled 
 up with weary days and sleepless nights. " Our 
 light affliction is but for a moment." And be- 
 sides the briefness of our earthly span, we know 
 that the coming of the Lord draweth nigh. 
 This is consolation, for it tells not only of the 
 end of our tribulation, but of the beginning of 
 our triumph ; nay, and not only of our indi- 
 vidual rest from trouble ; but of the rest and 
 deliverance of the whole church together. For 
 then the whole " body of Christ," waking or 
 sleeping, shall be glorified with their glorified 
 Lord, and everlasting joy shall be upon their 
 heads. In the day of bereavement, the day of 
 mourning over those who have fallen asleep in 
 Jesus, this consolation is especially precious. 
 Them that sleep in Jesus will God bring with 
 him. And if the Lord be near, the time of 
 re-union may not be far off. They that lie 
 down at evening have a whole night's slumber 
 before them ; but they who lie down towards 
 morning have, it may be, but an hour or less 
 till the dawn awakes them. So with the dead 
 in Christ, in these last days. They will not
 
 THE CONSOLATION. 173 
 
 have long to sleep, for it is now the fourth 
 watch of the night, and the day-star is pre- 
 paring to arise. What consolation ! How it 
 soothes the pain of parting ! How it cheers 
 the wounded spirit ! " Awake, and sing, ye 
 that dwell in dust," is now our watchword 
 every day. We take our stand upon our watch- 
 tower, and look out amidst the darkness of 
 night for the first streaks of morn. We lay our 
 ear to the ground and listen, that amid all the 
 discord of earth, the uproar of war, the tumults 
 of the nations, we may catch the first sound 
 of our Lord's chariot- wheels, those chariot- 
 wheels that are to s"weep in vengeance over the 
 field of Armageddon, crushing the confederate 
 nations leagued against the Lord and his 
 anointed, and also to bring to the bosom of the 
 long-betrothed bride, the husband of her youth, 
 the desire of her soul, for whom, amid tears 
 and loneliness, she has waited for many a 
 generation, many a century, in vain. 
 
 .11. All is love. Affliction is the expression 
 ol t atetnal love. It is from the deepest recess 
 of the fountain of love that sorrow flows down 
 to us. And love cannot wrong us. It blesses, 
 but cannot curse. Its utterances and actings 
 are all of peace and gladness. It wants a 
 larger vessel into which to empty itself, and a 
 15*
 
 174 THE CONSOLATION. 
 
 deeper channel through which to flow. That 
 is all. It seeks to make us more susceptible 
 of kindness, and then to pour that kindness in. 
 Yes, love is the true, the one origin of the 
 sharpest stroke that ever fell upon a bleeding 
 heart. The truth is, there is no other way of 
 accounting for affliction but this. Anger will 
 not account for it, forgetfulness will not account 
 for it, chance will not account for it. No. It 
 is simply impossible to trace it to any cause, but 
 love. Admit this as its spring ; and all is har- 
 monious, comely, perfect. Deny it ; and all is 
 confusion, cruelty, and darkness. Chastising 
 love is the faithfulest, purest, truest, tenderest, 
 deepest of all. Let this be our consolation. 
 
 Beloved, " it is well." It is GOOD to be afflicted. 
 Our days of suffering here we call days of 
 darkness ; hereafter they will seem our bright- 
 est and fairest. In eternity we shall praise 
 Jehovah, most of all for our sorrows and tears. 
 So blessed shall they then seem to us, that we 
 shall wonder how we could ever weep and sip-h. 
 We shall then know "how utterly unworthy 
 we were of all this grace. We did not deserve 
 anything, but least of all to be afflicted. Our 
 joys were all of grace, pure grace, much 
 more our sorrows. It is out of the " exceeding 
 riches of the grace of God" that trial comes.
 
 CHAPTER XV. 
 
 THE ETERNAL RESULTS 
 
 "!F we suffer we shall also reign with 
 him." Of this we are assured. Oneness in 
 suffering here, is the pledge of oneness in 
 glory hereafter. The two things are insepara- 
 ble. His shame is ours on earth ; his glory 
 shall be ours in heaven. Therefore, let us 
 " rejoice, inasmuch as we are partakers of 
 Christ's sufferings, that when his glory shall 
 be revealed, we may be glad also with ex 
 ceeding joy."* 
 
 Truly the sufferings of this present life, are 
 not worthy to be compared with the glory 
 which shall be revealed in us. The incor- 
 ruptible crown is so surpassingly bright, and 
 the "inheritance of the saints in light" so 
 excellent, that we may well be ashamed even 
 to speak of present sorrow. How will the 
 eternal light absorb the darkness here ! How 
 will the blessedness of the kingdom swallow 
 up our earthly calamities and complaints ! 
 One hour of eternity, one moment with the 
 Lord, will make us utterly to forget a lifetime's 
 desolations. 
 
 * 1 Pet. iv. 13.
 
 176 THE ETERNAL RESULTS. 
 
 But more than this. Our troubles now do 
 but enhance the coining joy. Our affliction 
 is not only " light," not only " but for a mo- 
 ment ;" but it worketh for us a far more ex- 
 ceeding and eternal weight of glory. Our 
 sorrows here are but adding to the weight of 
 our eternal crown. In what way they do so 
 we are not told. It is sufficient that we kno\\ 
 upon God's authority, that such is really the 
 case. Need we then grudge or yebel against 
 that which is preparing for us such glad and 
 sure results 1 
 
 As to the nature of the recompense, God has 
 revealed much to us ; at least in so far as 
 human language and earthly figures can set it 
 forth. In the epistles to the seven churches 
 of Asia, we have the fullest opening up of this 
 manifold reward. For " him that overcometh," 
 there is an abundant " weight of glory" pro- 
 vided. To each of the seven conquerors there 
 is a separate reward, and taking them all to- 
 gether, what a fulness of infinite blessing is 
 comprised in this sevenfold recompense ! To 
 one conqueror there is promised the " tree of 
 life." To another, the " crown of life," and de- 
 liverance from the second death. To another, 
 " the hidden manna," the " white stone," and 
 iii it the new, the unknown name. To 
 another, power over the nations, the iron rod 
 of rule, the morning-star. To another, the 
 white raiment and enrolment in the book of
 
 THE ETERNAL RESULTS. 177 
 
 life. To another, the honor of being made a 
 pillar in the temple of God, and of having 
 written on him the name of God, and the 
 name of His city, God's own new name. 
 To another, a seat upon the throne of Christ, 
 joint dominion with him in his kingdoro / 
 joint heirship with him in his inheritance, for 
 "he that overcometh shall inherit all things." 
 True, this recompense is only " to him that 
 overcometh." It is a life-time's battle, a 
 wrestling not only with flesh and blood, but 
 with principalities and powers, with the rulers 
 of the darkness of this world, with spiritual 
 wickedness in high places. But then, however 
 desperate the warfare, it is not forever. Nay, 
 it is brief, very brief. Its end is near, very 
 near. And with the end come triumph, and 
 honor, and songs of victory. Then, too, there 
 follows peace, and the return of the war-worn 
 soldier to his quiet dwelling. 
 
 "Now the soft peace-march beats, home, brothers, home." 
 
 This is the joy of the saint. He has fought 
 a good fight, he has finished the course, he 
 has kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid 
 up for him the crown of righteousness. His 
 battle is over, and then for him there are rest 
 and home. Home ! Yes, home. And what 
 a home for us to return to and abide in forever ! 
 A home prepared before the foundation of the 
 world, a home in the many mansions, a home
 
 178 THE ETERNAL RESULTS, 
 
 in the innermost circle of creation, nearest the 
 throne and heart of God, a home whose peace 
 shall never be broken by the sound of war or 
 tempest, whose brightness shall never be over- 
 cast by the remotest shadow of a cloud. How 
 solacing to the weary spirit to think of a rest- 
 ing-place so near, and that resting-place our 
 father's house, where we shall hunger no more, 
 neither thirst any more, where the sun shall 
 not light on us, nor any heat, where the Lamb 
 that is in the midst of the throne shall feed us, 
 and lead us to living fountains of waters, and 
 God shall wipe away all tears from our eyes. 
 
 The time is at hand. The church's con- 
 flicts are almost over. Its struggles and sor 
 rows are nearly done. A few more years, and 
 we shall either be laid quietly to rest, or caught 
 up into the clouds to meet our coming Lord. 
 A few more broken bonds, and then we shall 
 be knit together in eternal brotherhood with 
 all the scattered members of the family. A 
 few more suns shall rise and set, and then 
 shall ascend in its strength, the one unsetting 
 sun. A few more days shall dawn and darken ; 
 and then shall shine forth the one unending 
 day. A few more clouds shall gather over us, 
 and then the firmament shall be cleared for- 
 ever. A few more sabbaths shall come round, 
 filling up the sum of our privileges and com- 
 pleting our allotment of time ; and then the 
 everlasting sabbath shall begin. But a few
 
 THE ETERNAL RESULTS. 179 
 
 brief years, and we shall " enter in through 
 the gates into the city," sitting down beneath 
 the shadow of the tree of life, feeding upon 
 the hidden manna, and drinking of the pure 
 river clear as crystal, which proceedeth out 
 of the throne of God and of the Lamb. But 
 a few years and we shall see his face, and his 
 name shall be upon our foreheads. 
 
 These are some of the eternal results ; 
 results which are mightily heightened and en- 
 hanced by our tribulation here. For affliction 
 not only profits us much just now, but it will 
 serve us much in eternity. Then we shall 
 discover how much we owe to it. All that it 
 is doing for us, we know not now, but we shall 
 know hereafter. It is preparing for us a 
 " more abundant entrance," a weightier crown, 
 a whiter robe, a sweeter rest, a home made 
 doubly precious by a long exile and many 
 sufferings here below. 
 
 Of these results we have only the foretaste 
 now. The full brightness is in reserve, and 
 we know that all that is possible or conceiva- 
 ble of what is good and fair and blessed shall 
 one day be real and visible. Out of all evil 
 there comes the good ; out of sin comes holi- 
 ness ; out of darkness, light ; out of death, 
 life eternal ; out of weakness, strength ; out 
 of the fading, the blooming ; out of a 
 quenched planet, a sun for the universe ; out 
 of rottenness and ruin, comeliness and ma-
 
 180 THE ETERNAL RESULTS. 
 
 jesty ; out of the curse, the blessing ; and 
 RESURRECTION shall prove the wondrous 
 truth, that if. is the gravs, the place of bones 
 and dust, that is the womb of the incor- 
 ruptible, the immortal, the glorious, the un- 
 defiled. 
 
 Our present portion, however, is but the 
 earnest, not the inheritance. That is re- 
 served for the appearing of the Lord. Here 
 \ve see but through a glass darkly. It doth 
 not yet appear what we shall be. We are 
 but as wayfaring men, wandering in the 
 lonely night, who see dimly upon the distant 
 mountain-peak the reflection of a sun that 
 never rises here, but which shall never set in 
 the " new heavens" hereafter. 
 
 And this is enough. It comforts and cheers 
 us on our dark and rugged way. It would 
 not be enough hereafter; but it is enough 
 just now. The wilderness will do for us till 
 we cross into Canaan. The tent will do till 
 the " city of habitation" comes. The joy of 
 believing is enough, till we enter on the joy 
 of seeing. We are content with the ' : moun- 
 tain of my/rh and ths hill of frankincense," 
 until the day break and the shadows flee 
 away."* 
 
 * Song of Solomon, iv, 6, 7. 
 THE END.
 
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