20 A VISION OK
building ; John ii. 20. During which space, how often did the hearts of the people of God faint in their troubles, as though thev should never have seen an end ? And there- fore, ever and anon they were ready to give over, as Hag. i. 2. But yet we see the decree was fixed, and all those va- rieties did but orderly work in an exact method for the glo- rious accomplishment of it.
England's troubles have not yet endured above half the odd years of those reformers' task ; yet, good God ! how short breathed are men ! What fainting is there! What re- pining, what grudging against the ways of the Lord ! But, let me tell you, that as the water in the stream will not go higher than the head of the fountain, no more will the work in hand be carried one step higher, or beyond the aim of its fountain, the counsel of God, from whence it hath its rise. And yet as a river will break through all oppositions, and sv/ell to the height of mountains, to go to the sea from whence it came ; so will the stream of the gospel, when it comes out from God, break down all mountains of opposi- tion, and not be hindered from resting in its appointed place. It were an easy thing to recall your minds to some trembling periods of time, when there was trembling in our armies, and trembling in our councils ; trembling to be ashamed, to be repented of; trembling in the city, and in the country ; and men were almost at their wits' end for the sorrows and fears of those days; and yet we see how the unchangeable purpose of God hath wrought strongly through all these straits, from one end to another, that nothing might fall to the ground of what he had determined. If a man in those days had gone about to persuade us, that all our pressures were good omens, that they all wrought to- gether for our good, we could have been ready to cry with the woman, who when she had recounted her griefs to the physician, and he still replied, they were good signs, 6i fxol ayaOwv (nroWv/xi, ' good signs have undone me,' these good signs will be our ruin : yet behold, we hope, the contrary. Our day hath been like that mentioned, Zech. xiv. 6, 7. a day whose light is neither clear nor dark, a day known only to the Lord, seeming to us to be neither day nor night. But God knew all this while that it was a day ; he saw how it all wrought for the appointed end ; and in the evening, in
UNCHANGEABLE, FREE MERCY. 21
the close, it will be light, so light as to be to us discern- able. In the mean time, we are like unskilful men, going to the house of some curious artist, so long as he is about his work, despise it as confused ; but when it is finished, admire it as excellent : whilst the passages of providence are on us, all is confusion, but when the fabric is reared, glorious.
Use 2. Learn to look upon the wisdom of God in carry- ing all things through this wonderful variety, exactly to an- swer his own eternal purpose; suffering so many mountains to lie in the way of reforming his churches, and settling the gospel, that his Spirit may have the glory, and his people the comfort in their removal. It is a high and noble con- templation, to consider the purposes of God, so far as by the event revealed, and to see what impressions his wisdom and power do leave upon things accomplished here below, to read in them a temporary history of his eternal counsels. Some men may deem it strange, that his determinate will, which gives rule to these things, and could in a word have reached its own appointment, should carry his people so manyjourneys in the wilderness, and keep us thus long in so low estate: I say, not to speak of his own glory, which hath sparkled forth of this flinty opposition, there be divers things, things of light, for our good, which he hath brought forth out of all that darkness, wherewith we have been over- clouded. Take a few instances.
(1.) If there had been no difficulties, there had been no deliverances. And did we never find our hearts so enlarged towards God upon such advantages, as to say, Well, this day's temper of spirit, was cheaply purchased by yesterday's anguish and fear? that was but a being sick at sea.
(2.) Had there been no tempests and storms, we had not made out for shelter. Did you never run to a tree for shelter in a storm, and find fruit which you expected not .' Did you never go to God for safeguard in these times,"" driven by out- ward storms, and there find unexpected fruit, the ' peace- able fruit of righteousness,'^ that made you say, Happy tempest, which cast me into such a harbour? It was a storm"' that occasioned the discovery of the golden mines of
^ Prov. xviii. 10. Heb. xii- 11.
'" Pet. Mart, (k Rclig. J iid. dccad. 1. lil). 1 .