1. That we may be conformed to our head, and pledge him in his bitter cup. Jesus Christ was a man of sorrows, and there would be a strange disproportion between head and members if we should live altogether in honour and pleasure : Col. i. 24, ' That I may fill up what is behind of the sufferings of Clu-ist in my flesh.' There is Christ personal and Christ mystical ; the suflerings of Christ personal are complete, and there is nothing behind to be filled up ; but the suffer- ings of Christ mystical are not perfect till every member have their allotted portion. It is an unseemly delicacy to be nice of carrying the cross after Christ. The apostle counted the 'fellowsbip of his suffer- ings, and conformity to his death,' an honour and privilege to be bought at the dearest rates, Phil. iii. 10. All things should be dung and dross to gain this experience and honour.
2. God would have his people seen in their proper colours ; that they are a sort of people that love him above all that is dear and pre- cious to them in the world, and that they do not own Christ upon extrinsic and foreign motives, that their example may be a help to promote mortification in the world ; therefore all his people shall be tried : James i. 12, ' Blessed is the man that endureth temptation ; for when he is tried, he shall receive the crown of life which God hath promised to them that love him;' and Kev. ii. 10, ' Behold the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried ;' 1 Peter i. 7, ' That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found to praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ.' God will try the foundation that men build upon, and whether his people love him above all, yea or no; and teach the world to subordinate the animal life to the divine and spiritual.
3. God will have the world seen in their proper colours ; the far
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greater part of the world do live an ungodly, sensual life, and they cannot endure those that would disgrace their delights by a contrary course : John xv. 19, ' Tlie world loveth its own ; but I have chosen you out of the world, therefore the world hateth you ;' 1 Peter iv-. 4, ' Tiiey think it strange that you run not with them into the same excess of riot.' A contrary course produceth contrary afTections and interests ; thence cometh their hatred and malignity against the saints, because they upbraid them with their sins. The wicked and the righteous, the spiritual and the carnal, the sensual and the heavenly, the formal and the serious, can no more agree than the wolf and the lamb, the raven and the dove.
4. It is needful that our pride and carnal affections should be broken by the cross : 1 Peter i. 6, ' Ye are in heaviness for a season, if need be.' This smart discipline is needful to reclaim us from our wanderings, to cutoff the provision for the flesh, which is an enemy ; to humble us for sin, which is the greatest evil ; to wean us from the world, to make us more mindful of heavenly things, to make us thankful for our deliverance by Christ. How lazy and vain do the best grow when they live in wealth, honour, and power ! Graces are eclipsed, duties obstructed, thoughts of heaven few and cold. We often fear the dejection of the godly ; we need more fear their exaltation. What lamentable work do they make in the world when they get upper- most; so that we have more cause to thank Christ for our afflictions than our prosperity.
Use 1. Is instruction: that we have no reason to doubt of God's favour and presence with us though we be exercised with calamities, and divers calamities. Single calamities are consistent enough with the love of God to his people. God is a Father when he frowneth, as well as when he smileth. Christ was the Son of his love, and yet a man of sorrows. And so for christians : Eev. iii. 19, 'As many as I love, I rebuke and chasten.' God loveth those most whom he doth not leave to perish with the godless and unbelieving world ; and divers calamities, or variety of troubles, tribulation, distress, persecu- tion, famine, nakedness, peril, sword, call it by what name you will, it is all incident to the saints. Some trials, to ordinary sense, seem to speak wrath, utter wrath, rather than love ; as when he seemeth to have broken off his ordinary course of kindness to his people, and to cast them out of his protection, leaving them in the hand and will of their enemies, so that they are reproached, troubled, and reduced to great straits and necessities. All this is necessary ; for till an utter exigence, carnal supports are not spent, and one trial by continuance is blunted and loseth its edge till God send another; therefore we need not one affliction only, but divers. But how many soever they be, we have no reason to question the love of God : Job v. 19, 20, ' He shall deliver thee in six troubles, yea, in seven there shall no evil touch thee. In famine he shall redeem thee from death, and in war from the power of the sword.' In nakedness he will clothe thee, in per- secution preserve thee, in peril protect thee, in distress comfort thee ; though it Cometh to the greatest trouble, yet we have no cause to despond, as if God had cast us off, or withdrawn his love from us.