Chapter 19
More solid grain with greater strength you thrash,
The ablest Christians have the hardest lash.
OBSERVATION.
HUsbandmen having to do with divers sorts of grain some more tough and stubborn; others more free and tender, do not beat all alike in the threshing floor; but as they have threshals of several sizes, so they bestow on some grain more, on other fewer strokes, according to the different qualities of the grain to the threshed. This observation the Prophet Isaiah has, Chop. 28. v. 27. The Fitches are not thereshed with a threshing instrument, neither is the Cart-wheel turn'd about upon the Cummin, but the Fitches are beaten out with a staff, and the Cummin with a rod. The manner of beating out the corn in ancient times, was far different from that which is now in use among us; they had the Cart-wheel, which was full of iron spokes or teeth, and the hoofs of beasts for the harder sort of grain, as Wheat, Rye and Barley, a staff or flail for the Fitches, and a rod or twig for the Cummin; all which instruments were proportioned according to the nature of the grain.
APPLICATION.
GOd having to do in a way of correction with divers sorts of offenders, does not use the like severity with them all, but proportions his correction to their abilities and strength, Ier. 30. 11. I will not make a full end of you, but will [correct you in measure] and will not leave you altogether unpunished, (q. d.) afflicted you must be, my respect to my own glory and your good, puts a necessity upon that; but yet I will do it moderately, I will not lay on without measure or mercy, as I intend to do upon the enemies; but will mete out your sufferings in a due proportion, even as a careful Physician in prescribing pills or potions to his Patients, has regard as well to the ability of the Patient as to the nature and quality of the disease; even so your God, O Israel, will not afflict you according to the greatness of his power and his wrath; answerable thereunto, Psal. 90. 11. that would break you to pieces, Psal. 78. 38. Nor yet will he afflict you according to the demerit of your sin. As it shall be much less than what I could inflict; so it shall be less than your iniquities deserve, Ezra. 9. 13. Neither my power, nor your desert, shall be the rule of my proceedings; but I will do it with moderation and mercy, as you art able to bear. I that have instructed the Husbandman to proportion his instruments to the quality of the grain before him, will exercise the like wisdom and mildness towards the you, and the similitude between the Husbandmans threshing his corn, and the Lords afflicting his people, stands in these particulars.
The Husbandmans end in threshing the corn, is to separate it from the husks and chaff; and God's end in afflicting his people, is to separate them from their sins, Isa. 27. 9. In measure when it shooteth forth, he will debate with it, (i. e.) he will moderately correct them; and what the end of those corrections are, the next words inform us; By this therefore shall the iniquity of Iacob be purged, and this is all the fruit to take away his sin. God uses afflictions, as we use sope, to cleanse away filthiness, and fetch out spots, Dan. 11. 35. he aimes not at the destruction of their persons, but of their lusts.
If the Husbandman have cockle, darnel, or pernicious tares before him in the floor among his corn, he little regards whether it be bruised and battered to pieces by the threshold or no; 'tis a worthless thing, and he spares it not. Such cockle and tares are the enemies of God; and when these come under his flail, he strikes them without mercy; for these, the Lord prepares a new sharp threshing instrument having teeth, which shall beat them to dust, Isa. 41. 15. The daughter to Babylon is like a threshing floor; 'tis time to thresh her, Ier. 51. 33. And when that time is come, then (in allusion to the beast, that was to tread out the corn) Sion's horn shall be of iron, and her hoofs brass, Mich. 4. 13. He smites not his people, according to the stroke of them that smote them; the meaning is, his strokes on them shall be d[•]adly strokes. They shewed no mercy to Sien, and God will shew no mercy to them.
When the husks and chaff are perfectly separated from the grain, then the Husbandman beats it no more. When God has perfectly purged and separated the sins of his people, then afflictions shall come to a perpetual end, he will never smite them again; there is no noise of the threshing instrument in heaven; he that beat them with his flail on earth, will put them into his bosom in heaven.
Though the Husbandman layes on, and beates his corn, as if he were angry with it, yet he loves and highly prizes it, and though God strike and afflict his people, yet he sets a great value upon them? and it is equally absurd to infer God's hatred to his people from his afflicting of them, as the Husbandmans hatred of his corn, because he threshes and beats it Heb. 12. 6. Whom the Lord loveth he correcteth, and chasteneth every son whom he receiveth.
Though the Husbandman thresh and beat the corn, yet he will not bruise or hurt if he can help it; though some require more and harder strokes that others, yet none shall have more than it can endure. And though the Lord afflict his servants, yet he will do them no hurt, Ier. 25. 6. Some need more rods that others, but none shall have more than they can bear; the Lord knows the measures and degrees of his servants faith and patience, and accordingly shall their tryals be, Psal. 103. 13, 14. Like as a father pities his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him; for he knows their frame, he remembers they are but dust; he makes a way to escape, that they may be able to bear it, 1 Cor. 10. 13. This care and tenderness of God over [•]is afflicted, is eminently discovered in three particulars.
(1) In not exposing them to, till he have prepared them for their tryals, Luke 24. 49. Tarry you at Ierusalem until you be endued with power from on High. He gives them sometimes eminent discoveries of his love immediately before, and as a preparative to their sufferings; in the strength whereof, they are carried through all.
(2) Or if not so, then he intermixeth supporting comfort with their troubles, as you sometimes see the Sun shine out while the rain falls. 'Twas so with Paul, Act. 27. 23. This night (and it was a sad night indeed) there stood by me the Angel of the Lord, whose I am.
3. In taking off the affliction, when they can bear it no longer, 1 Cor. 10. 13. He makes a way to escape, that they may be able to bear it. Psal. 125. 3. The rod is taken off, when the righteous is even ready to put forth his hand to iniquity. 'Tis a Iewish Proverb, When the bricks are doubled, then comes Moses, And it is a Christian experience, When the spirit is ready to fail, then comes Iesus; according to that promise Isa. 57. 16.
REFLECTIONS.
HOw unlike am I to God, in the afflicting of his people? The Lord is pitiful when he smites them, but I have been cruel. He is kind to them, when most severe; but the best of my kindnesses to them, may fitly enough be called severity. God smites them in love, I have smitten them in hatred. Ah, what have I done? God has used me as his hand, Psal. 17. 14. or as his rod to afflict them, Ier. 10. 7. but his end and mine have widely differed in that action, Isa. 10. 7. I am but the Scullion, or rather the wisp so S[•]our and cleanse these vessels of glory, and when I have done that dirty work, those bright souls shall be set up in heaven, and I cast into the fire. If he shall have judgment without Mercy, that shewed no mercy; how can I expect mercy from the Lord, whose people I have persecuted mercilesly for his sake?
Is the Lord's Wheat thus threshed in the floor of affliction? What then shall I think of my condition, who prosper and am let alone in the way of sin? surely the Lord looks on me as on a weed, and not as his corn; and 'tis too probable that I am rather reserved for burning, than threshing. Some there are whom God loves not so well as to spend a rod upon them, but faith, Let them alone, Hos. 4. 17. but miserable is their condition; notwithstanding their impunity; for what is the interpretation but this? I will come to a reckoning with them for altogether in hell. Lord, how much better is your afflicting mercy, than your spa[•]ing severity! Better is the condition of an afflicted child, than of a rejected bastard. Heb. 12. 7. O, let me rather feel your rod now, as the rod of a loving father, than feel your wrath hereafter, as the wrath of an omnipotent avenger.
Well then, despond not, O my soul, you hearest the Husbandman loves his corn though he thresheth it: and surely the Lord loves you not the less, because he afflicts you so much. If affliction then be the way to heaven, blessed be God for affliction. The threshing strokes of God have come thick upon me, by which I may see, what a tough and stubborn heart I have; if one stroke would have done the work, he would not have lifted up his hand the second time. I have not had a stroke more than I had need of, 1 Pet. 1. 6. and by this means he will purge my sin, blessed be God for that. The damned have infinitely more and harder strokes than I, and [•]et their sin shall never be separated by their sufferings. Ah, sin, cursed sin, I am so much out of love with you, that I am willing to endure more than all this to be well rid of you; all this I suffer for your sake, but the time is coming when I shall be rid of sin and suffering together. Mean while I am under my own fathers hand, smite me he may, but hate me he cannot.
The Poem.
THe sacred records tell us, heretofore
God had an Alter in a threshing floor;
Where threshing instruments devoted were
To sacred service, so you find them here.
I now would teach the thresher to beat forth,
A notion from his threshold much more worth
Than all his corn; and make him understand
That soul-instructing engine in his hand.
With fewer strokes, and lighter you will beat
The Oats and Barley? than the stubborn wheat,
Which will require and endure more blows,
Than freer grain. Thus deals the Lord by those
Whom he afflicts. He does not use to strike
Offending children, with his rod alike.
But on the ablest shoulders does impose,
The heaviest burdens; and the less on those
Of weaker grace. He shews himself a God
Of judgment, in his handling of the rod.
God has a rate book by him, wherein he
Keeps just accounts, how rich his peop[•]e be;
What [•]aith, experience, patience more or less
Each one possesseth, and does them assess
According to their stock. Such as have not
A Martyrs faith, shall have no Martyrs lot.
The kinds, degrees, and the continuance
Of all their sufferings, to a circumstance;
Prescribed are by him who wisely swayes
The world, more than's right on no man layes.
Be man or devil the apothecary,
God's the Physician; who can then miscarry
In such a hand? he never did, or will
Suffer the least addition to his bill.
Nor measure, nor yet mercy he observes
In threshingBabilon, for the deserves
His heaviest strokes; and in his floor she must
Be beaten shortly with his flail to dust.
But Sion's God in measure will debate,
his children he may smite; but cannot hate.
He beats them, true, to make their chaff to flye;
That they like purged golden graines may lye
In one fair heap, with those bless'd souls that here
Once in like manner thrash'd, and winnowed were.
