Afflictions

"AFFLICTIONS" By John Bunyan "All the afflictions of God's people are measured by the hand of the most wise, most merciful and gracious God. All the malice of men and devils, cannot add a dram to the weight, nor a drop to the measure, beyond God's appointment."
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"AFFLICTIONS" Puritan Stephen Charnock.
"Whether they come from man, as loss of goods or other calamities; whether they be sicknesses, griefs, &c; they are all dispensed by the order of God for one and the same design, viz., our instruction. Human reason doth not believe this. Some think they come by chance, or look only to second causes, and regard them not as wholesome instructions from God, and the orders of His providence."

The Banner of Truth 1970-1971 (Issues 86-99) Sept 1971 pg12 "William Cowper and his Afflictions." Also see "Extracts from Cowper's Poems...Pg. 11,32,40.

Thomas Brooks: "The flowers smell sweetest after a shower; vines bear the better for bleeding; the walnut-tree is most fruitful when most beaten; saints spring and thrive most internally, when they are most externally afflicted. Afflictions are the mother of virtue. Manasseh's chain was more profitable to him than his crown. . . .All of the stones that came about Stephen's ears did but knock him closer to Christ, the corner-stone."

"He draws out the core"

"Afflictions are the Lord's drawing-plasters, by which
He draws out the core of pride, earthliness, self-love,
covetousness, etc. Pride was one of man's first sins,
and is still the root and source of all other sins. Now,
to prevent it, God many times chastens man with pain,
yes, with strong pain, upon his bed: Job 34:31-32,
"I have endured my punishment; I will no longer act
wickedly. Teach me what I cannot see; if I have done
wrong, I won't do it again." The burnt child dreads the
fire. Sin is but a bitter sweet; it is an evil worse than
hell itself. Look, as salt brine preserves things from
putrefying; so sanctified rods, sanctified afflictions,
preserves and keeps the people of God from sinning."



AFFLICTIONS

Two things should comfort suffering Christians, namely, all that they suffer is not hell; yet it is all the hell they shall suffer.

**Afflictions are not so much threatened as promised, to the children of God.

**By affliction God separates the sin which He hates,
from the soul which He loves.

**Sin is the poison, affliction the medicine.

**If the servants of Christ are ever so low and afflicted,
yet His heart is with them, and His eye upon them.

**God takes it unkindly when we grieve too much for any outward thing; because it is a sign we fetch not that comfort from Him which we should.

**Though the hand of God may be against you;
yet the heart of God may be towards you.

**What is bearing a temporal cross, to the wearing an eternal crown?

**Our enjoyments are greater than our afflictions,
and our afflictions less than our sins.

**Our sufferings should stir up our graces as well as our griefs.

THOMAS BROOKS: "The flowers smell sweetest after a shower; vines bear the better for bleeding; the walnut-tree is most fruitful when most beaten; saints spring and thrive most internally, when they are most externally afflicted. Afflictions are the mother of virtue. Manasseh's chain was more profitable to him than his crown.... All the stones that came about Stephen's ears did but knock him closer to Christ, the corner-stone."

WILLIAM JENKYN: "Such is the condition of grace, that it shines the brighter for scouring, and is most glorious when it is most clouded."

Samuel Johnson said: ""It is by affliction chiefly that the heart of man is purified, and that the thoughts are fixed on a better state. Prosperity has power to intoxicate the imagination, to fix the mind upon the present scene, to produce confidence and elation, and to make him who enjoys affluence and honors forget the hand by which they were bestowed. It is seldom that we are otherwise than by affliction awakened to a sense of our imbecility, or taught to know how little all our acquisitions can conduce to safety or quiet, and how justly we may inscribe to the superintendence of a higher power those blessings which in the wantonness of success we considered as the attainments of our policy and courage."

The wounded and wounding hand of the Savior!
(From Winslow's "The Obscurations of Spiritual Life")

E. W. Lucas
www.friendship-baptistchurch.com
Phone: 1-434-352-8377
Mobile: 1-434-660-7807