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
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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:rTV':-.
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
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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-
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