AFFLICTION
Affliction
is one of God's medicines! By it He
often teaches lessons which would be learned in no other way. By it He often draws souls away from sin and
the world, which would otherwise have perished everlastingly. Health is a great blessing but sanctified
disease is a greater. Prosperity and
worldly comfort, are what all naturally desire, but
losses and crosses are far better for us if they lead us to Christ. Let us beware of murmuring in the time of
trouble. Let us settle it firmly in our
minds, that there is a meaning, a 'needs be', and a message from God in every sorrow
that falls upon us. There are no lessons
so useful as those learned in the school of
affliction. There is no commentary that
opens up the Bible so much as sickness and sorrow. The resurrection morning will prove, that many of the losses of God's people were in
reality, eternal gains. Thousands at the
last day will testify with David, "It is good for me that I have been
afflicted" (Psalm. 119:71)!
The
Gospel of John.
No
words can express how much the world owes to sorrow. Most of the Psalms were born in the
wilderness. Most of the Epistles were
written in a prison. The greatest
thoughts of the greatest thinkers have all passed through fire. The greatest poets have “learned in suffering
what they taught in song.” In bonds
Bunyan lived the allegory that he afterwards wrote, and we may thank Bedford
Jail for the Pilgrim’s Progress.
Take comfort, afflicted Christian!
When God is about to make pre-eminent use of a person, He put them in
the fire.
Your
afflictions may only prove that you are more immediately under the Father's
hand. There is no time that the patient
is such an object of tender interest to the surgeon, as when he is bleeding
beneath his knife. So you may be sure if
you are suffering from the hand of a reconciled God, that His eye is all the
more bent on you.
(Affliction)
brings out graces that cannot be seen in a time of health. It is the treading of the grapes that brings
out the sweet juices of the vine; so it is affliction that draws forth
submission, weanedness from the world, and complete
rest in God. Use afflictions while you
have them.
Comfort in Sorrow,
Christian Focus, 2002, p. 25, Used by Permission.
(Affliction
is sometimes) sent for the conversion of the soul. Sometimes in health the Word does not touch
the heart. The world is all. Its gaieties, its pleasures, its admiration,
captivate your mind. God sometimes draws
you aside into a sickbed, and shows you the sin of your heart, the vanity of
worldly pleasures and drives the soul to seek a sure resting-place for eternity
in Christ. O happy sickness that draws
the soul to Jesus (Job 33, Psm. 107).
Comfort in Sorrow,
Christian Focus, 2002, p. 6, Used by Permission.
God's
children should not doubt His love when He afflicts. Christ loved Lazarus peculiarly, and yet He
afflicted Him very sore. A surgeon never
bends his eye so tenderly upon his patient, as when he is putting in the
lancet, or probing the wound to the very bottom. And so with Christ – He bends His eye most
tenderly over His own at the time He is afflicting them… A goldsmith when he casts gold into the
furnace looks after it.
Comfort in Sorrow,
Christian Focus, 2002, p. 11, Used by Permission.
(Affliction)
shows the power of Christ's blood, when it gives peace in an hour of trouble,
when it can make happy in sickness, poverty, persecution and death. Do not be surprised if you suffer, but
glorify God.
Comfort in Sorrow,
Christian Focus, 2002, p. 24-25, Used by Permission.
I
find afflictions to be good for me. I
have always found them so. Afflictions
are happy means in the hands of the Holy Spirit to subdue my corruptions, my
pride, my evil passions, my inordinate love to the
creature. Afflictions soften my hard
heart, bring me to my knees, increase faith, increase love, increase humility,
increase self-denial. Afflictions make
me poor in spirit, and nothing in my own eyes.
Those
who dive in the sea of affliction bring up rare pearls.
The
Lord gets his best soldiers out of the highlands of affliction.
The
furnace of affliction is a good place for you, Christian; it benefits you; it
helps you to become more like Christ, and it is fitting you for heaven.
As
sure as God puts His children in the furnace of affliction, He will be with
them in it.
Most
of the grand truths of God have to be learned by trouble; they must be burned
into us with the hot iron of affliction, otherwise we shall not truly receive
them.
I would go
to the deeps a hundred times to cheer a downcast spirit. It is good for me to
have been afflicted, that I might know how to speak a word in season to one
that is weary.
There
is no attribute of God more comforting to His children than the doctrine of
Divine Sovereignty. Under the most adverse circumstances, in the most severe
troubles, they believe that Sovereignty hath ordained their afflictions, that
Sovereignty overrules them, and that Sovereignty will sanctify them all.
C.H. Spurgeon
Divine Sovereignty, 1856.
The more afflictions you have been under, the more assistance you have had for this life of holiness.
The
Fountain of Life, 1671.
Extraordinary
afflictions are not always the punishment of extraordinary sins, but sometimes
the trial of extraordinary graces.
Sanctified afflictions are spiritual promotions.
When
I am in the cellar of affliction, I look for the Lord’s choicest wines.
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner
of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 17
Poverty
and affliction take away the fuel that feeds pride.
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner
of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 16.
There
are some things good but not pleasant, as sorrow and affliction. Sin is pleasant, but unprofitable; and sorrow
is profitable, but unpleasant. As waters
are purest when they are in motion, so saints are generally holiest when in
affliction.
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner
of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 285.
The
Lord does not measure out our afflictions according to our faults, but
according to our strength, and looks not what we have deserved, but what we are
able to bear.
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner
of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 12.
It
is one heart-quieting consideration in all the afflictions that befall us, that
God has a special hand in them: “The
Almighty hath afflicted me.” Instruments
can no more stir till God gives them a commission, than the axe can cut of
itself without a hand. Job eyed God in
his affliction: therefore, as Augustine
observes, he does not say, “The Lord gave, and the devil took away,” but “The
Lord hath taken away.”
A Puritan Golden Treasury, compiled by I.D.E. Thomas, by permission of Banner
of Truth, Carlisle, PA. 2000, p. 13.
The
godly have some good in them, therefore the devil afflicts them; and some evil
in them, therefore God afflicts them.
Affliction
may be lasting, but it is not everlasting.
Affliction was a sting, but withal a wing: sorrow shall soon fly away.
Afflictions
add to the saints’ glory. The more the
diamond is cut, the more it sparkles; the heavier the saints’ cross is, the heavier will be their crown.
I am mended
by my sickness, enriched by my poverty and strengthened by my weakness… What
fools are we, then, to frown upon our afflictions! Those, how crabbed soever, are our best friends. They are not intended for our
pleasure, they are for our profit.
Unknown Puritan
The
Lord can so manifest Himself to His afflicted people that the season of
affliction shall be to them a season of great consolation. He is to them – a
fountain of life, of strength, of grace and comfort in the afflictive hour – and
of His fullness they receive, as their necessities require. The Lord Jesus
Christ is a sun to enlighten and cheer His afflicted followers, and a shield to
defend them. He is a hiding-place from the storm, a covert from the tempest,
and as the shadow of a great rock in a dry and weary land.
John Fawcett
Christ Precious.
All
the afflictions of God’s people are designed, under His gracious management – to
test, to make manifest, and to exercise, those graces and virtues which He has
implanted in them. Though afflictions in themselves are not joyous but
grievous, nevertheless they yield the peaceable fruits of righteousness in
those who are exercised thereby. Afflictions serve to quicken the spirit of
devotion in us; and to rouse us from that formality and indifference which
frequently attend a long course of ease and prosperity. We are constrained to
seek God with sincerity and fervor, when His chastening hand is upon us, since
we then feel our absolute need of that help and deliverance, which He alone can
give us.
John Fawcett
Christ Precious.
Afflictions
serve most effectually to convince us of the vanity of all that this world can
afford, to remind us that this is not our rest and to stir up desires and hopes
for our everlasting home. They produce in us a spirit of sympathy towards our
companions in tribulation. They give occasion for the exercise of patience,
meekness, submission, and resignation. Were it not for the wholesome and necessary
discipline of affliction, these excellent virtues would lie dormant.
Afflictions serve to convince us more deeply of our own weakness and
insufficiency, and to endear the person, the grace, the promises, and the
salvation of our Redeemer, more and more to our hearts. Thus we are taught to
esteem His very chastisements as precious on account of the benefits we derive
from them.
John Fawcett
Christ Precious.
Afflictions
are not to punish, but to purify the believing soul. They are not in wrath, but
in mercy. Amidst the distresses and miseries of life – it is a felicity to
belong to Christ, without whose permission and appointment, no evil can befall
us! He always sends afflictions for our good; and knows by experience, what it
is to suffer them. His kind hand will speedily put an end to all the pains we
feel when we have derived from them all the good which He intends to do for us,
by them.
John Fawcett
Christ Precious.
How
many, how suitable, how sovereign are the supports our heavenly Father affords
to His afflicted children! They make the affliction, which in itself would seem
heavy and tedious appear to be light, and but for a moment. It is happier to be
in the furnace of affliction with these supports than to be in the highest
prosperity without them! Blessed with the hopes and comforts of Christ! The
true Christian would prefer the lot of Lazarus, with all the poverty and
distress which he endured to the lot of the rich man, who, amidst all the
splendor and affluence which this world could afford – lived a life of
alienation from God, and destitute of the sovereign supports which can only be
enjoyed, by those who love and fear Him.
John Fawcett
Christ Precious.
Afflictions
make the heart more deep, more experimental, more knowing and profound, and so,
more able to hold, to contain, and beat more.
In
times of affliction we commonly meet with the sweetest experiences of the love
of God.
God never
allows pain without a purpose in the lives of His children. He never allows Satan, nor
circumstances, nor any ill-intending person to afflict us unless He uses
that affliction for our good. God never
wastes pain. He always causes it to work
together for our ultimate good, the good of conforming us more to the likeness
of His Son (see Romans 8:28-29).
Jerry Bridges
Transforming
Grace, NavPress, 1991, p. 139.
Used by permission of NavPress – www.navpress.com. All rights
reserved.
Affliction
and suffering have been appointed by God as instruments He uses to make us more
holy, to make us more like Jesus. They
remind us that we are weak and we must rely not on ourselves, but on
Jesus. They remind us that this world is
not our home but that we are only passing through toward our real home in
heaven with our Father, our Savior, Jesus Christ, and our Comforter, the Holy
Spirit.
Michael Beates
Tabletalk, p. 55, v. 28, n. 9, Ligonier
Ministries, Used by Permission.
Iron
till it be thoroughly heated is incapable to be wrought; so God sees good to
cast some men into the furnace of affliction, and then beats them on His anvil
into what frame He desires.
The
Lord afflicts us at times; but it is always a thousand times less than we
deserve, and much less than many of our fellow-creatures are suffering around
us. Let us therefore pray for grace to
be humble, thankful, and patient.
A
believer may pass through much affliction, and yet secure very little blessing
from it all. Abiding in Christ is the
secret of securing all that the Father meant the chastisement to bring us.
Afflictions
are light when compared with what we really deserve. They are light when compared with the
sufferings of the Lord Jesus. But
perhaps their real lightness is best seen by comparing them with the weight of
glory which is awaiting us.
The
sorest afflictions never appear intolerable, but when we see them in the wrong
light; when we see them in the hand of God, Who dispenses them; when we know
that it is our loving Father who abases and distresses us; our sufferings will
lose their bitterness and become even a matter of consolation.
Afflictions
tend to wean us from the world - and to fix our affections on things
above.
The Widow Directed
to the Widow's God, 1841.
Resolved,
after afflictions, to inquire, what I am the better for them, and what I might
have got by them.
Resolution
Number 67.