CHAP. II.

in afflicting

Shews, that although God takes 110 delight bis people, yet be fometimes expofeth them to great and grievous sufferings, with a brief account why, and how he calls them thereunto.

THE mercies and compassions of God over his people are exceed

T

ing great and tender, Pfal. ciii. 13. "Like as a father pitieth "his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him." He delights not in afflicting and grieving them, Lam. iii. 33. "He doth not af"flict willingly, nor grieve the children of men." The fcripture intimates to us a feeming conflict betwixt the justice and mercy of God, when he is about to deliver up his people into their enemies hands, Hofea xi. 8, 9. "How shall I give thee up, Ephraim? How shall I " deliver thee, Ifrael? How shall I make thee as Admah? How shall "I fet thee as Zeboim? Mine heart is turned within me, my re-" pentings are kindled together." Which shews us with what reluctance and great unwillingness the Lord goes about such a work as this. The work of judgment is his Arange work, it pleases him better to execute the milder attribute of mercy towards his children. Hence we find, when he is preparing to execute his judgments, that he delays the execution as long as the honour of his name and fafety of his people will permit, Jer. xliv. 23. He bears till he can bear no longer: he often turns away his wrath from them, Pfal. lxxviii, 38, 39. He tries them by leffer judgments and gentler corrections to prevent greater, Amos iv. 6. When his people are humbled under the threatenings of his wrath, his heart is melted into compaffion to them, Jer. xxxi. 17, 20. and whenever his mercy prevails again't judgment, it is with joy and triumph, Jam. ii. 13. Mercy rejoiceth against judgment.

For he feels his own tender compaffions yerning over them; he foreseeth, and is no way willing to gratify the insulting pride of his and their enemies. Deut. xxxii. 26, 27. "I faid I would scatter " them into corners, I would make the remembrance of them to " cease from among men, were it not that I feared the wrath of the " enemy, left their adverfaries should behave themselves strange"ly, &c.

Yet all this, notwithstanding, it often falls out, by the provocations of his fons and daughters, that the Lord gives them up into the hands of their enemies for the correction of their evils, and the manifeftation of his own glory. Seneca, though a heathen, could say, that God loves his people with a mafculine love, not with a womanish indulgence and tenderness: If need require, they shail be in heaviness through manifold temptations, I Pet. i. 6. He had rather their hearts thould be heavy under adverfity, than vain and careless under profperity; the choicest spirits have been exercised with the Tharpeft fufferings, and those that now shine as stars in heaven, have been trod under foot as dung on the earth. 1 Cor. iv. 11, 12, 13. "Unto this present hour we both hunger and thirst, and are na"ked, and buffetted, and have no certain dwelling-place, and la"bour, working with our hands; being reviled we bless, being per" fecuted we fuffer it, being defamed we intreat; we are made as "the filth of the world, and the off-fcouring of all things unto this "day." The eleventh chapter to the Hebrews is a compendium of the various and grievous fufferings of the primitive faints: "They "were tortured, they were fawn asunder, were tempted, were flain " with the sword, they wandered about in sheep-skins and goat-skins, " being afflicted, destitute, tormented, of whom the world was not "worthy, they wandered in deferts, and in mountains, in dens, and " in caves of the earth." And fince the earth hath dried up those rivers of precious blood, whereof the sacred records make mention, what feas of Christians blood have fince those days been shed by bloody perfecutors ? Histories inform us that in the ten primitive persecutions, so many of the faints and martyrs of Jesus Christ have been flain, as that you may allow five thousand a day to every day in the whole year. Those bloody emperors sported themselves with the death of God's dearest saints; many precious Christians were burnt by night at Rome, to serve as torches to light their enemies in their paffage through the streets; eight hundred thousand martyrs are mentioned within the space of thirty years, fince the Jefuits arose out of the bottomless pit.

To what grievous fufferings did the Lord give up those precious servants of Christ, the Waldenses and Albigenses, who received the light of reformation about the year 1260, when the fogs of Antichristian darkness overspread the earth! a people found in judgment, as appears by their letters, catechisms, and confeffions, which are extant; a people of a simple, plain, and inoffensive behaviour: Yet, with what fury and rage did that impious pope Pius perfecute them to destruction! driving them into the woods and mountains, except the aged, and children that could not flee, who were murdered in the way: Some famished in the caves and clefts of the rocks; others endured the rack for eight hours together; some beaten with iron rods, others thrown from the tops of high towers, and dashed to pieces.

What bloody shambles and flaughter-houses have France, Ireland, and England, been made by popish cruelty! More might be related out of each story than a tender-hearted reader is able to bear the re•hearsal of. But what God hath done, he may do again: We are not better than our fathers, difmal clouds of indignation are gathering over our heads, charged with double destruction; should the Lord please to make them break upon us; we cannot imagine the rage of Satan to be abated, now that his kingdom hastens to its period, Rev. xii. 12. nor are his instruments grown less cruel and skilful to destroy. The land, indeed, hath enjoyed a long rest, and this ge

neration is acquainted with little more of martyrdom, than what the histories of former times inform us of: But yet let no man befool himself with a groundless expectation of continuing tranquillity. Augustin thinks that the bloody sweat which over-ran the body of Christ in the garden, fignified the sharp and grievous fufferings which in his mystical body he should afterwards endure; and indeed it is a truth, that these are alfo called the remains of Christ's fufferings, Col. i. 24. His perfonal sufferings were indeed completed at his refurrection, that cup was full to the brim, to which no drop of fufferings can be added; but his fufferings in his myftical body are not yet full; by his personal sufferings he fully fatisfied the wrath of God, but the sufferings of his people have not yet fatisfied the wrath of men: Though millions of precious faints have shed their blood for Chrift, whose souls are now crying under the altar, How long, Lord! how long! yet there are many more coming on behind in the fame path of perfecution, and much Christian blood must yet be shed, before the mystery of God be finished; and notwithstanding this lucid interval, the clouds seem to be returning again after the rain. Thus you fee to what grievous sufferings the merciful God hath sometimes called his dearest people.

Now God may be faid to call forth his people to fuffer, when he so hedgeth them in by providence, that there is no way to escape fuffering, but by finning; whatsoever providence labours with such a dilemma as this, is a plain fignification of God's will to us in that cafe. We may not now expect extraordinary calls to fuffering work, as some of the faints had of old, Gen. xxii. 2. Acts ix. 16. but when our way is so shut up by providence, that we cannot avoid suffering, but by stepping over the hedge of the command, God will have us look upon that exigence as his call to fuffer: And if the reasons be demanded, why the Lord, who is inclined to mercy, doth often hedge in his own people, by his providence, in a fuffering path; let us know, that in so doing, he doth both,

1. Illustrate his own glory. And,
2. Promote his people's happiness.

First, Hereby the most wife God doth illustrate the glory of his own name, clearing up the righteousness of his ways by the fufferings of his own people: By this the world shall fee, that how well foever he loves them, he will not indulge or patronize their sins; if they will be so difingenuous to abuse his favours, he will be so just to make them fuffer for their fins, and by those very fufferings will provide for his own glory, which was by them clouded in the eyes of the world. He hates not fin a jot the less, because it is found in his own people, Amos iii. 2. And though, for the magnifying of his mercy, he will pardon their fins, yet for the clearing of his righteousness, he will take vengeance upon their inventions, Pfal. xcix. 8.

Moreover, by expofing his people to fuch grievous fufferings, he gives a fit opportunity to manifeft the glory of his power in their fupVOL. VI.

B

port, and of his wisdom, in the marvellous ways of their efcape and deliverance. It is one of the greatest wonders in the world, how the church subsifts under such fierce and frequent affaults as are made upon it by its enemies. "I will turn afide (faid Mofes) and fee this

great fight, why the bush is not confumed," Exod. iii. 3. That flaming bush was a lively emblem of the oppreffed church in Egypt; the crackling flames noted the heat of their perfecution, the remaining of the bush unconfumed in the flames, signified the wonderful power of God in their prefervation: No people are so privileged, fo protected, fo delivered, as the people of God. Much less oppofition than hath been made against the church, hath overturned, and utterly destroyed, the mighty monarchies of the world.

*

6

Sic Medus ademit

Affyrio, Medoque tulit moderamina Perfes,
Subjecit Perfen Macedo, ceffurus et ipfe
Romanis

Affyria's empire thus the Mede did shake,
• The Perfian next, the pride of Media brake;
• Then Persia sunk by Macedonia prest,

That, in its turn, fell by Rome at last.'

And no less admirable is the wisdom of God, in frustrating and defeating the most deep and defperate defigns of hell, against his poor people. Now, you may fee the most wife God going beyond a malicious and fubtle devil, overturning in a moment the deep laid defigns and contrivances of many years, and that at the very birth and point of execution, Efth. vi. 1. sharing the wicked in the works of their own hands; making their own tongues to fall upon them; working out such marvellous falvations with his own hand, as fills them with aftonishment and wonder. Pfal. cxxvi. 7. "When the " Lord turned back the captivity of Zion, we were like them that

" dreamed."

Secondly, As God provides for his own glory, by the fufferings and troubles of his people; fo he advanceth their happiness, and greatly promotes their interest thereby.

For, First, These troubles are ordered as so many occafions and means to mortify the corruptions that are in their hearts; there are rank weeds springing up in the best foil, which need fuch winter weather to rot them: And, certainly, if we reckon humility, heavenly mindedness, contempt of the world, and longing defires after heaven, to be the real interest and advantage of the church; then it is evident, nothing so much promotes their interest, as a fuffering -condition doth: Adversity ills those corruptions which profperity

:

!

Secondly, By these trials their fincerity is cleared, to the joy and fatisfaction of their own hearts; many a doubt and fear, which had long entangled and perplexed them, is removed and answered. When adverfity hath given them proof, and trial of their own hearts, one sharp trial wherein God helps us to be faithful, will do more to fatisfy our fears, and refolve our doubts, than all the fermons that ever we heard in our lives could do.

Thirdly, These sufferings and trials of the church, are ordained to free it of abundance of hypocrites, which were its reproach, as well as burden, Amos ix. 9. 10. Affliction is a furnace to separate the dross from the more pure and noble gold. Multitudes of hypocrites, like flies in a hot summer, are generated by the church's profperity; but this winter weather kills them: Many gaudy profeffors grow within the inclosure of the church, like beautiful flowers in the field, where they ftand during its peace and profperity, in the pride and bravery of their gifts and professions; but the wind passeth over them, and they are gone, and their places shall know them no more; to allude to that in Pfalm ciii. 16. Thunder and lightning is very terrible weather, but exceeding useful to purify and cleanse the air.

Fourthly, The church's fufferings are ordered and fanctified, to endear them to each other. Times of common suffering, are times of reconciliation, and greater endearments among the people of God; never more endeared, than when most persecuted; never more united, than when most scattered, Mal. iii. 17. "Then they that fear"ed the Lord, ipake often one to another." Certainly there is fomething in our fellowship in the same sufferings, that is endearing and engaging; but there is much more in the discoveries that perfe

I cution makes of the fincerity of our hearts, which, it may be, was before entertained with jealoufy; and there is yet more than all this in the reproofs of the rod, whereby they are humbled for their pride, wantonness, and bitterness of their spirits to each other, and made to cry, in the sense of these tranfgreffions, as Pfal. lxx. 8. "Remem" ber not against us former iniquities."

i

Laftly, By these troubles and distresses, they are awakened to their duties, and taught to pray more frequently, spiritually, and fervently. Ah! what drowsiness and formality is apt to creep in upon the best hearts, in the time of profperity; but when the storm rises, and the sea grows turbulent and raging, now they cry as the disciples to Chrift, Lord, fave us, we perish. They say music is sweetest upon the waters; I am fure the sweetest melody of prayer is upon the deep waters of affliction: For thefe, among many other righteous, wife, and holy ends, the Lord permits and orders the perfecutions and distresses of his people.