It is true, likewise, besides peace of conscience, of all other peace, peace of success and peace of state. That all creatures and all conditions are peaceable to us, whence is it ? It is from grace. For God, being recon- ciled, he reconciles all. When God himself is ours, all is ours. When he is turned, all is turned with him. WTien he becomes our Father in Christ, and is at peace with us, all are at peace besides. So that all conditions, all estates, all creatures, they work for our good. It is from hence, when God is turned, all are turned with him. He being the God of the creature, that sustains and upholds the creature, in whom the creature hath his being and working, he must needs therefore turn it for the good of them that are in covenant with him. All that are joined in covenant with him, he fills them with peace, because they are in gi-ace with him.
This should stir up our hearts, above all things in the world, to pray for grace, to get grace, to empty ourselves of self-confidence, that we may be vessels for grace, to make grace our plea, to magnify the grace of God.
We must never look in this world for a peace altogether absolute. That is reserved for heaven. Our peace here is a troubled peace. God will have a distinction between heaven and earth. But when our peace is in- terrupted, when the waters ' are come into our souls,' Ps. Ixix. 1, what must be our course ? When we would have peace, go to grace, go to the free promise of grace in Christ. ' Grace and peace.'
* From God otir Father, and the Lord Jesiis Christ.' The spring of grace and peace are here mentioned.
After the preface, he comes to the argument which he intends ; and begins with blessing.
One part of the scope of this blessed apostle is, to avoid the scandal* of his sufferings ; for he was a man of sorrows, if ever man was. Next Christ, who was a true man of sorrow, the blessed apostle was a man of miseries and sorrow. Now, weak, shallow Christians thought him to be a man deserted of God. They thought it was impossible for God to regard a man so forlorn, so despicable as this man was. What doth he ? Before he comes to other matters, he wipes away this imputation and clears this scandah You lay my crosses, and sufferings, and disgraces in the world to my shame ! It is your'weakness. That which you account my shame is a matter of praise. I am so far fi-om bemg disheartened or discouraged from what I suffer, that,
* That is, ' to take away the stumblingblocL'— G.
22 OOMMENTASY ON
VERSE 3.
' Blessed he God, the Father of Christ, the Father of mercies,'' dc. That which to the flesh is matter of scandal and oflence, that to the spirit and to a sj^iritual man is matter of glory, so contrary is the flesh and the spirit, and so opposite is the disposition and the current of the fleshly man to the spiritual man. Job was so far from cursing God for taking away, that ho saith, ' Blessed be the name of God,' not only for giving, but for taking away too, Job i. 21.
What ground there is in troubles and persecutions to bless God we shall see in the current and passages of the chapter.
To come, then, to the vciy verse itself, where there is a blessing and praising of God first ; and in this praising consider
The act, object, reasons.
1. The act, ' Blessed be God,' which is a praising.
2. The object is ' God the Father.
3. The reasons are enwrapped in the object, ' Blessed be God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.'
(1.) Because he is the God and Father of Jesus Christ, therefore blessed be he. Another reason is,
(2.) Because he is the ' Father of mercies.' Another reason is, ' (3.) From the act of this disposition of mercy in God, he is the ' God of all comfort,' and as he is comfortable, so he doth comfort. ' Thou art good and doest good,' saith the psalmist, Ps. cxix. 68. Thou art a God of comfort, and thou dost comfort. For as he is, so he doth. He shews his nature in his working, ' Blessed be God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, and God Of comfort,' of which I shall speak when I come to them.
* Blessed he God, the Father,' dc. We see here the heart of the blessed apostle, being warmed with the sense and taste of the sweet mercy of God, stirs up his tongue to bless God ; a full heart and a fuU tongue. We have here the exuberancy, the abundance of his thankfulness breaking forth in his speech. His heart had first tasted of the sweet mercies and comforts of God before he praiseth God. The first thing that we v/ill ob- serve hence is, that
It is the dis2)ositio7i of God's children, after they have tasted the siveet mercy and comfort and love of God, to break foiih into the praisiny of God and to thanksyiviny.