people had walked worthy of their high calling : but when they were dissatisfied and rebellious, it seemed to him as if all his labour had been in vain. Had he been their natural father, he would have thought it reasonable enough that he should take the oversight of them : but when he had no other relation to them than that which was common to all, he deemed it a hardship to have so great a charge committed to him ; and he begged that God would release him from it by taking away
his life Alas ! what is human nature when it comes to
be severely tried ! ]
But from this we learn some very important lessons —
We learn what the ministerial office is —
[God says to a Minister, " Take this people," and, " as a nursing father carried his sucking child" through the wilderness, where there were no other means for its conveyance, so do you " carry them in your bosom," bearing with all their frowardness, attending to all their wants, administering to all their necessities, and seeking your happiness in their welfare." O ! what a charge is this ! and what grace do they need who have to sustain and execute it! O that all of us resembled Pauld ! •]
We learn also what a Minister's heaviest affliction is.
[If his people be obedient to their God, great as his difficul- ties are, he is willing to bear them : his people are " his joy and crown of rejoicing : " " he lives, when they stand fast in the Lord : " "he has no greater joy than to see his children walk in truth." But when they decline from the ways of God, when they are dissatisfied with his ministrations, and begin to despise the bread of life, because it is plain and unmixed with any thing suited to a carnal appetite, then he is grieved, and wounded in his inmost soul ; then life itself becomes a burthen to him, and he is ready to wish for death to put a period to his sorrows. We remember how Paul was grieved by the world- liness and sensuality of some, and by the heretical conduct of others : he could not speak of them without tears e ; and he was always like a woman in travail, by reason of his anxiety for their welfare f. " The care of all the churches" was a heavier burthen to him than all his own perils and dangers, whether by sea or land. " None were weak, but he was weak also;" nor were any offended and turned aside, but " he burned" with an ardent desire to restore them. O that every minister were thus wrapped up in the good of the people committed to his care ! " His afflictions might abound ; but his consolations should abound" also.]
d 1 Thess. ii. 7, 8. e Phil. iii. 18, 19. f Gal. iv. 19.