[Are we under trials ? we should view our sufferings as ordered by God himself in number, weight, and duration, and consider them as means appointed by him for the perfecting of his work within us. Then, whatever our trials be, we shall not give way to an undue depression of mind ; but shall commit ourselves to God in silent resignation, and wait for our recom- pence in the eternal world.]
THE STATE OF GOD's CHILDREN.
Rom. viii. 23. And not only they, but ourselves also, ivhich have the first-fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves, ivaiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body.
MUCH is spoken in Scripture respecting the hap- piness of the saints. And doubtless they are on many accounts the most blessed people upon earth. But they also experience in a great degree the sorrows that pervade the universe. It is not in this, but in the future world, that they are to attain perfect unin- terrupted felicity.
The Apostle is here encouraging the afflicted Christians to endure their trials patiently, in expec- tation of a rich eternal recompence. He tells them that the whole creation were supported under their present sufferings by a hope of some happier state : and that he himself, notwithstanding the privileges he enjoyed, participated with them in the common lot.
From his words we are led to consider, I. The state of the creation at large —
This is fully developed in the four verses preceding our text. There are however considerable difficulties in those verses; but chiefly arising from the inaccu- racy of the translation. Read them thus, and the main difficulties will be overcome : " The earnest expectation of the creation waiteth for the manifes- tation of the sons of God : (for the creation was made subject to vanity, not willingly, but by reason of him who hath subjected the same ;) in hope that the creation itself also shall be delivered from the bondage
1874.] THE STATE OF GOD's CHILDREN. 295
of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God. For we know that the whole creation groaneth and travaileth in pain together until now." Thus, by translating the word ktlols, creation, and the word cm, that, and by inclosing a part in a paren- thesis, the whole will be made clear, and to a certain degree easy.
[The whole creation was reduced to a very deplorable con- dition by the fall of man. The material world underwent a most awful change : cursed was the ground for man's sake : the earth rendered barren without continual and laborious culture, or fruitful only in briers and thorns, which, if left unrestrained, would speedly overrun it : and the atmosphere rendered the fatal source of storms, and tempests, and pestilen- tial vapours for the destruction of mana. The animal world, first subjected to man's controul, and innoxious in all their habits, had such a change wrought within them, that they all of various orders prey one upon another, and are more or less arrayed in hostility to man. The rational world partook more largely still of this fatal change : for man universally, and without exception, was despoiled of the Divine image, and corrupted in all his faculties, whether of mind or body, and subjected to innumerable diseases, and miseries, and death.]
But things shall not always continue thus —
[There is a time coming, when God will manifest himself in a more especial manner to his own people ; and it is there- fore called, " The manifestation of the sons of God :" and then shall the sentence denounced against the whole creation be reversed, in order that every creature, according to its capacity, may partake of that universal blessedness. The material world will become again what it was at first, beautiful in all its parts, fertile to the utmost extent of man's necessities, and salubrious throughout every place and every clime. The animal world shall have all their venomous propensities removed, and the prophet's description shall be fully realized among them, "the wolf dwelling with the lamb, and theleopard lyingdown with the kid; and the calf and the young lion, and the fading together; and the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand upon the cockatrice' den : they shall not hurt nor destroy throughout God's holy moun- tain b." The whole rational world shall then be converted unto God; " for the knowledge of the Lord shall cover the earth, as the waters cover the sea."