Chapter 9
Section 1.
These are some of the ways and methods in which God brings his gold to the touchstone and to the fire, even in this world, before the awful and solemn trial they must come to in the final judgment. And if we desire to be satisfied as to what the design and end of God is in making such probations of his people:
We must conclude in the general that he certainly designs his own glory and his people's advantage and profit in them. If he suffers them to be tried by reproaches, happy are they — the spirit of glory and of God rests on them; there is their profit. And though his name be evil spoken of, yet in the meekness of their spirits he is glorified, as it is in 1 Peter 4:14. 'If the scourge slays suddenly, he laughs at the trial of the innocent' (Job 9:23) — not at their afflictions, but at the effects and blessed issues and results of them. Not that it gives them pain, but that it gives him glory. Upon this account the apostle bids us count it all joy when we fall into various temptations or trials. And still the more trials, the more joy; for thereby God will produce such effects as are more precious than gold that perishes (1 Peter 1:7). O who can value the comfort that is tasted by the soul upon the trial and discovery of its sincerity! When after some sore temptation wherein God has helped us to maintain our integrity, or after some close pinching affliction wherein we have discovered in ourselves a sweet resignation to and contentment in the will of God — a heart cleaving to the Lord, purged and made more spiritual under the rod — we can turn to the Lord and appeal to him as the prophet did (Jeremiah 12:3): 'But you, O Lord, know me; you have seen me, and tried my heart toward you.'
Who can duly value such an advantage? who would exchange such a comfort for all the gold and silver in the world! However many trials God brings his people under, to be sure neither his own glory nor their interest shall suffer any damage by them.
Section 2.
But more particularly, let us bring our thoughts close to the matter before us, and we shall find many great advantages and benefits rising out of these trials of sincerity.
First, hereby hypocrisy is unmasked and discovered. The mask is plucked off from the false professor, and his true natural face and complexion shown to the world. And in this there is a great deal of good.
Objection: Good, you will say — where does it lie? All the world sees the mischief and sad effects of it. Many are stumbled, many are hardened by it. 'Woe to the world because of offenses' (Matthew 18:7).
Answer: True, some are prejudiced and hardened by it, so as never to have good thoughts of the ways and people of God more. That is sad indeed. However, therein God accomplishes his word and executes his decree. And though these perish, yet:
First, others are warned, awakened, and set to searching their own hearts more narrowly than ever. And this is good: 'Now these things were our examples; wherefore let him that thinks he stands take heed lest he fall' (1 Corinthians 10:11-12).
Secondly, hereby sin is shamed. And it is good when sin that has exposed men to so much shame shall itself be exposed to shame. This is the just reward of sin (Jeremiah 13:25-26): 'This is your lot, the portion of your measures from me,' says the Lord, 'because you have forgotten me and trusted in falsehood, therefore will I discover your skirts upon your face, that your shame may appear.'
The turning up of the skirt is a modest expression of exposing a person to the greatest shame. In the day of trial, God by discovering hypocrisy shames the hypocrite. And surely many such discoveries are made of men in this day; we may see sin that lurked close in the heart before, now laid open before all Israel and before the sun.
Thirdly, hereby the poor self-deceiving hypocrite has the greatest opportunity and advantage that ever was before him in all his life to recover himself out of the snare of the devil. Now all his pretenses are gone. Now that which, like a shield, was advanced against the arrows of reproof and conviction is gone. Now a poor creature stands naked and stripped out of all his pleas, as a fair and open mark to the word and his own conscience. And happy will it be for him if now the Lord makes conviction to enter point-blank into his soul. All these are blessed effects of the discovery of hypocrisy.
Secondly, by these trials integrity is cleared up, and the doubts and fears of many upright and holy ones are allayed and quieted, resolved and satisfied.
O what would many a poor Christian give for satisfaction in that great point of sincerity! How many tears have been shed to God in secret upon that account? How many hours have been spent in examination of his own heart about it, and still jealousies and fears hang upon his heart? He doubts what he may prove at last. Well, says God, let his sincerity then come to the test. Kindle the fire and cast in my gold. Trials are the highway to assurance. Let my child see that he loves me more than these — that his heart is upright with me. I will try him by prosperity and by adversity, by persecutions and temptations, and he shall see his heart is better than he suspects it to be. This shall be the day of resolution to his fears and doubts.
The apostle, speaking of heresies (1 Corinthians 11:19), puts a necessity upon them: 'There must be heresies, that they which are approved may be made manifest.' The same necessity there is — and for the same end — of all other trials of grace: that the lovely, beautiful, sweet face of sincerity may be opened sometimes to the world to enamor them, and to the soul in whom it is, to satisfy it that it does not personate a Christian but lives the very life of a Christian, and has the very spirit and principles of a Christian in him.
Thirdly, by these trials pride and self-confidence are destroyed and mortified in the saints as much as by anything in the world. We never see what poor, weak creatures we are until we come to the trial. It is said (Deuteronomy 8:2): 'God led Israel through the desert to prove them and to humble them.' When we are proved, then we are humbled. Those that highly reckon their graces before the trial see they must come to another account and take new measures of themselves after they have been upon trial.
'Ah, little did I think,' says one, 'that I had so much love for the world and so little for God, until afflictions tried it.' 'I could not have believed that ever the creature had gotten so deep into my heart, until providence either threatened or made a separation — and then I found it.' 'I thought I had been rich in faith, until such a danger befell me, or such a want began to pinch hard; and then I saw how unable I was to trust God for protection or provision.' O it is a good thing that our hearts be kept humble and lowly, however rich they may be in grace.
Fourthly, by trials grace is kept in exercise, and the gracious soul is preserved from security and spiritual slothfulness. Trials are to grace what the continual agitations of the waters are to the sea, or what the racking of wines from the lees is to it. Were it not for our frequent trials and exercises, we should quickly settle upon the lees. Our duties would be — as God complains of Ephraim — like flat, dead drink (Hosea 4:18). 'Moab has been at ease from his youth, and he has settled on his lees, and has not been emptied from vessel to vessel, neither has he gone into captivity; therefore his taste remained in him, and his scent is not changed' (Jeremiah 48:11).
Much after that rate it would be with our hearts, did not the Lord frequently try and exercise them. Let the best man be without some trial or other but a few months, and you may find the want of it in his prayers and conversations quickly. O what a taint of formality will be found in them! And is it for the honor of God or the profit of his people that it should be so? No, no — the Lord knows it is not. But how shall their spirits be reduced to the former zealous, heavenly temper again? Why, says the Lord, they must go into the furnace again. 'I will melt them and try them, for how shall I do for the daughter of my people?' (Jeremiah 9:7). 'I love them too well to lose them for want of a rod.' 'Alas, if I should suffer things to go on at this rate, what will become of them in a little time?' 'What delight can I take in their duties when the faith, fervor, humility, and holy seriousness of their spirits is wanting in them?' 'I will therefore refine them as silver is refined, and try them as gold is tried; and they shall call upon my name, and I will hear them; and I will say, it is my people; and they shall say, The Lord is my God' (Zechariah 13:9). And thus the Lord reconciles himself again with his people.
Thus he recovers them to their true temper, and thus his visitations preserve their spirits. And when the Lord sees these sweet effects of his trials upon them, it greatly pleases him. 'O, now,' says God, 'I like it.' 'This providence has done them good; this rod was well bestowed; the letting loose of this temptation or that corruption upon them has made them find their knees again.' 'Now I hear the voice of my child again.'
Beloved, this is a blessed fruit and effect of our frequent trials. And however ungrateful they are to flesh and blood, which affects ease and is loath to be disturbed, yet it is necessary to the preservation of our spirits.
Fifthly, by the trial of our graces Satan is defeated, and his accusations of the saints are found to be mere slanders. It is a very common thing with the devil and wicked men to accuse the people of God of hypocrisy, and to tell the world they are not the men and women they are taken to be. And that if their inside were but turned out by some thorough trial or deep search, it would appear that religion did not indeed live in their souls as they pretend, but that they only act a part and personate heavenly and mortified persons upon the public stage of profession.
Thus the accuser of the brethren suggests the hypocrisy of Job (chapter 2, verse 5): 'Put forth your hand now and touch his bone and his flesh, and he will curse you to your face.' As if to say, 'Well might Job serve you while you have been so bountiful a master to him; he has been well rewarded for all the service he has done you.' 'But if you stop the current of his prosperity, you shall see how quickly he will stop the course of his duty: a few lashes from your hand will make him curse you to your face.' But O what shame and disappointment was it to that envious spirit, and what a vindication of Job's integrity, when under the greatest trials of his faith and patience he still held fast his integrity and showed himself as great a pattern of patience under the cross as he had been of piety in the days of his greatest prosperity. Satan gets nothing by bringing forth the saints upon the stage to be made a spectacle to angels and men (1 Corinthians 4:9).
Sixthly and lastly, the frequent trials of grace exhibit a full and living testimony against the atheism of the world. These prove beyond all words or arguments that religion is no fancy, but the greatest reality in the world. Men would make religion but a fancy, and the zeal of its professors but the intemperate heat of some crazed brains, overheated with a fond notion.
Those that never felt the real influences of religion upon their own souls will not believe that others feel them. Serious piety has become the ludicrous subject with which the wanton wits of this atheistical world sport themselves. But behold the wisdom and goodness of God, exhibiting to the world the undeniable testimonies of the truth of religion as often as the sincere professors thereof are brought to the test by afflictions from the hand of God, or persecutions from the hands of men. Here is the faith and patience of the saints. Here is the courage, meekness, and self-denial shining as gold in the fire. They have the real proofs of it before their eyes. Instead of casting them into hell and convincing them by eternal fire, God is pleased to cast his own people into the fire of affliction, that those who scoff at them may be convinced at an easier and cheaper rate. It is no new thing to see the enemies of religion brought over to embrace it by the constancy and faithfulness of the saints in their trials and sufferings for it. God grant that the atheism of this present generation does not occasion a more fiery trial to the people of God in it than they have yet suffered.
