CHRIST'S SYMPATHY TO WEARY PILGRIMS contd

YOUR PRESENT ADVERSITY
"And we know that all things work together for good to those who love God, to those who are the called according to his purpose." Romans 8:28
It is palpably clear and emphatically true that all that occurs in the Lord's government of His people conspires for, and works out, and results in, their highest happiness and their greatest good. The gloomiest and most painful circumstances in the history of the child of God, without a solitary exception, are all conspiring, and all working together, for his real and permanent good.
The painful and inexplicable dispensations, which at the present moment may be thickening and deepening around your path, are but so many mysteries in God's government, which He is working out to their certain, satisfactory, and happy results. And when the good thus embosomed in the lowering cloud of some crushing providence, accomplishes its benevolent and heaven-sent mission, then trial will expand its dark pinions and fly away—and sorrow will roll up its somber drapery and disappear!
All things under the government of an infinitely great, all-wise, righteous, and beneficent Lord God, work together for good. What that good may be—the shape it may assume—the complexion it may wear—the end to which it may be subservient—we cannot tell. To our dim view it may appear an evil, but to God's far seeing eye it is a positive good. Oh, truth most divine! Oh, words most consolatory!
How many whose eye traces this page, it may be whose tears bedew it, whose sighs breathe over it, whose prayers hallow it, may be wading in deep waters, may be drinking bitter cups, and are ready to exclaim—"All these things are against me!" Oh no, beloved of God, all these things are for you! Do not be afraid! Christ restrains the flood upon whose heaving bosom He serenely sits. Christ controls the waters, whose sounding waves obey the mandate of His voice. Christ's cloudy chariot is paved with love! Then, fear not! Your Father grasps the helm of your storm-tossed vessel—and through cloud and tempest will steer it safely to the port of endless rest!
Will it not be a real good, if your present adversity results in the dethronement of some worshiped idol? in the endearing of Christ to your soul? in the closer conformity of your mind to God's image? in the purification of your heart? in your more thorough fitness for heaven? Will it not be a real good if it terminate in a revival of God's work within you—in stirring you up to more prayer? in enlarging your heart to all that love the same Savior? in stimulating you to increased activity for the conversion of sinners, for the diffusion of the truth, and for the glory of God?
Oh yes! good, real good, permanent good must result from all the Divine dispensations in your history. Bitter repentance shall end in the experienced sweetness of Christ's love. The festering wound shall but elicit the healing balm. The overpowering burden shall but bring you to the tranquil rest. The storm shall but quicken your footsteps to the Hiding Place. The bitter-cold north wind and the balmy south wind shall breathe together over your garden, and the spices shall flow out.
In a little while—oh, how soon! you shall pass away from earth to heaven, and in its clearer, serener light shall read the truth, often read with tears before, "And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose."
THE LITTLE THINGS OF LIFE!
"But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered." Luke 12:7
You know so little of God, my reader, because you live at such a distance from God. You have so little communion with Him—so little confession of sin—so little searching of your own conscience—so little probing of your own heart—so little transaction with Him in the little things of life. You deal with God in great matters. You take great trials to God, great perplexities, great needs; but in the minutiae of each day's history, in what are called the little things of life, you have no dealings with God whatever—and consequently you know so little of the love, so little of the wisdom, so little of the glory, of your resplendent covenant God and reconciled Father.
I tell you, the man who lives with God in little matters—who walks with God in the minutiae of his life—is the man who becomes the best acquainted with God—with His character, His faithfulness, His love. To meet God in my daily trials, to take to Him the trials of my calling, the trials of my church, the trials of my family, the trials of my own heart; to take to Him that which brings the shadow upon my brow, that rends the sigh from my heart—to remember it is not too trivial to take to God—above all, to take to Him the least taint upon the conscience, the slightest pressure of sin upon the heart, the softest conviction of departure from God—to take it to Him, and confess it at the foot of the cross, with the hand of faith upon the bleeding sacrifice—oh! these are the paths in which a man becomes intimately and closely acquainted with God!
ALL DROPPING FROM THE OUTSTRETCHED, MUNIFICENT HAND OF A LOVING, GRACIOUS, AND BOUNTIFUL FATHER!
Beloved, remember that all our past and all our coming prosperity, if indeed He shall so appoint it—is in the hand of God. It is His wisdom that suggests our plans, it is His power that guides, and it is His goodness that makes them successful. Every flower that blooms in our path—every smile that gladdens it—every mercy that bedews it, comes to us from our heavenly Father. Oh! for grace to recognize God in all our mercies! How much sweeter will be our sweets—how much more blessed our blessings—and endeared our endearments—to see them all dropping from the outstretched, munificent hand of a loving, gracious, and bountiful Father! Oh! for a heart lifted up in holy returns of love, gratitude and praise!
ALL THE VARIED DEALINGS
"He has done all things well." Mark 7:37
Yes, from first to last—from our cradle to our grave— from the earliest pang of sin's conviction to the last thrill of sin's forgiveness—from earth to heaven—this will be our testimony in all the way the Lord our God has led us in the wilderness—He has done all things well. In providence and in grace—in every truth of His Word—in every lesson of His love—in every stroke of His rod—in every sunbeam that has shone—in every cloud that has shaded—in every element that has sweetened—in every ingredient that has embittered—in all that has been mysterious, inscrutable, painful, and humiliating—in all that He gave—in all that He took away—this testimony is His just due, and this our grateful acknowledgment through time and through eternity—He has done all things well.
Has He converted us through grace by a way we had thought the most improbable? Has He torn up all our earthly hopes by the roots? Has He thwarted our schemes, frustrated our plans, disappointed our expectations? Has He taught us in the most difficult schools, by a most severe discipline, and lessons most humbling to our nature? Has He withered our strength by sickness? reduced us to poverty by loss? crushed our heart by bereavement? And have we been tempted to exclaim, "All these things are against me?"
Ah! no! faith will yet obtain the ascendancy, and sweetly sing—"I know in all things that befell, My Jesus has done all things well." Beloved, it must be so, for Jesus can do nothing wrong. Study the way of His providence and grace with the microscopic eye of faith—view them in every light, examine them in their minutest detail, as you would the petal of a flower, or the wing of an insect—and, oh, what wonders, what beauty, what marvelous adaptation would you observe in all the varied dealings with you of your glorious Lord. He has done all things well.
THAT MOST EXCELLENT AND SUPERLATIVE KNOWLEDGE!
There is everything we need in Jesus to endear His name to our hearts. He is our Prophet, teaching us the will of the Father. He is our Priest, offering up Himself as our atoning Victim. He is our King, erecting His throne in our hearts, and subduing us to Himself as His loving and obedient subjects. He is our Friend, loving us at all times. He is our Brother, bone of our bone, and flesh of our flesh, born for our adversity. He is our Great High Priest, touched with the feeling of our infirmities, tempted in all points as we are—and in our sorrows, griefs, and trials encircling us with the many-folded robe of His tender, loving sympathy.
O to know Jesus—that most excellent and superlative knowledge! With Paul we may well count all things but loss for its possession. To know Him as the Savior—to know Him as our Friend—to know Him as our Brother—to know Him as our Advocate—to know Him as our Portion, is endless life and glory!
A SOUL-SATISFYING SPECTACLE!
The sight of Jesus is a soul-satisfying spectacle! The penitent soul is satisfied, for it sees in Jesus a free pardon of sin. The condemned soul is satisfied, for it receives in Jesus a free justification. The believing soul is satisfied, for it discovers in Jesus a fountain of all grace. The tried, tempted, sorrowful soul is satisfied, for it experiences in Jesus all consolation, sympathy and love. Oh, what an all-satisfying Portion is Jesus! He satisfies every holy desire—for He realizes it. He satisfies every craving need—for He supplies it. He satisfies every sore grief—for He soothes it. He satisfies the deepest yearnings, the highest aspirations, the most sublime hopes of the renewed soul—for all these center and end in Him!
THE ALTOGETHER LOVELY ONE!
With what pen, dipped though it were in heaven's brightest hues, can we portray the image of Jesus? The perfection of our Lord was the perfection of holiness. His Deity, essential holiness; His humanity without sin, the impersonation of holiness. All that He was, said, and did, was as flashes of holiness emanating from the fountain of essential purity, and kindling their dazzling and undying radiance around each step He trod. How humble, too, His character! How holy the thoughts He breathed, how pure the words He spoke, how gentle the spirit He exemplified, how tender and sympathizing the outgoings of His compassion and love to man. He is the chief among ten thousand, the altogether lovely one!
THE CHIEF OBJECT OF YOUR STUDY
We know so much of divine truth, my reader, as we have in a measure a personal experience of it in our souls. The mere speculatist and notionalist in religion is as unsatisfactory and unprofitable as the mere theorist and declaimer in science. For all practical purposes both are but ciphers. The character and the degree of our spiritual knowledge begins and terminates in our knowledge of Christ. Christ is the test of its reality—the measure of its depth—and the source of its growth.
If you are advancing in an experimental, sanctifying acquaintance with the Lord Jesus, you are advancing in that knowledge which Paul thus estimates, "I count all things but loss for the excellency of the knowledge of Christ Jesus my Lord." Dear reader, let the chief object of your study be to know the Lord Jesus. It may be in the region of your sinfulness, emptiness, weakness, and foolishness that you learn Him. Nevertheless, however humiliating the school, slow the progress, and limited the attainment, count every fresh step you make in a personal acquaintance with the Lord Jesus as a nobler triumph, and as bringing you into the possession of more real wealth than were the whole chests of human knowledge and science mastered, and its untold treasures poured at your feet.
When adversity comes—when death approaches—when eternity unveils—oh! how indescribably valuable, how inconceivably precious will then be one faith's touch, one faith's glimpse of a crucified and risen Savior! All other attainments then vanish, and the only knowledge that abides, soothes, and comforts, is a heartfelt acquaintance with the most sublime fact of the Gospel—that Jesus came into the world to save sinners. Oh! Whatever other studies may engage your thoughts, do not forget, as you value your eternal destiny, to study the Lord Jesus Christ!
THE MOST ACCESSIBLE AND PRECIOUS SPOT
"Now there stood by the cross of Jesus his mother." John 19:25
Take your place with Mary, by the cross of Jesus. There meet and blend suffering and love—sorrow and sympathy. Standing in faith by the cross, you are near the suffering Savior, the loving Son, the sympathizing Brother born for your present grief. Jesus, in the depth and tenderness of His love, is at this moment all that He was when, in soul travail, He cast that ineffable look of filial love and sympathy upon His anguished mother.
Likewise, He can enter into your circumstances, understand your grief, sustain and soothe your spirit as one only can, who has partaken of the cup of woe which now trembles in your hand. Drink that cup submissive to His will—for He drank deeply of it before you—and has left the fragrance of His sympathy upon its brim. Your sorrow is not new to Christ. Stand close to the cross of Jesus! It is the most accessible and precious spot this side of heaven—the most solemn and awesome one this side of eternity!
The cross of Jesus is the focus of divine love, sympathy, and power. Stand by it in suffering, in persecution, in temptation. Stand by it in the brightness of prosperity and in the gloom of adversity. Go to Christ's cross in trouble, repair to it in weakness, cling to it in danger, hide beneath it when the wintry storm rushes fiercely over you. Near to the cross, you are near a Father's heart, a Savior's side. You seem to enter the gate of heaven—to stand beneath the vestibule of glory.
Nothing but love will welcome your approach to the cross of Jesus—love that pardons all your sins—flows over all your unworthiness—heals all your wounds—soothes all your sorrows—and will shelter you within its blessed pavilion until earth is changed for heaven, and you lay down the warrior's sword for the victor's palm, and spring from the foot of the cross to the foot of the throne, forever with the Lord!
HOW EMPTYING, HUMBLING, AND ABASING!
Cultivate frequent and devout contemplations of the glory of Christ. Immense will be the benefit accruing to your soul. The mind thus preoccupied, filled, and expanded, will be enabled to present a stronger resistance to the ever advancing and insidious encroachments of the world. No place will be found for vain thoughts, and no desire or time for carnal enjoyments. Oh, how crucifying and sanctifying are clear views of the glory of Emmanuel! How emptying, humbling, and abasing! With the patriarch, we then exclaim, "I abhor myself, and repent in dust and ashes." And with the prophet, "Woe is me! for I am undone; because I am a man of unclean lips, for mine eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts." And with the apostle, "But God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world."
Oh, then, aim to get your mind filled with enlarged and yet expanding views of the glory of the Redeemer. Let it, in all the discoveries it affords of the Divine mind and majesty, be the one subject of your thoughts—the one theme of your conversation. Place no limit to your knowledge of Christ. Ever consider that you have but read the preface to the volume; you have but touched the fringe of the sea. Stretching far away beyond you, are undiscovered beauties, and precious views, and sparkling glories, each encouraging your advance, inviting your research, and asking the homage of your faith, the tribute of your love, and the dedication of your life.
Go forward, then! The glories that yet must be revealed to you in a growing knowledge of Jesus, what imagination can conceive, what pen can describe them? Jesus stands ready to unveil all the beauties of His person; and to admit you into the very pavilion of His love. There is not a chamber of His heart that He will not throw open to you—not a blessing that He will not bestow upon you—not a glory that He will not show to you.
You shall see greater things than you have yet seen—greater depths of sin in your fallen nature shall be revealed—deeper sense of the cleansing efficacy of the atoning blood shall be felt—clearer views of your acceptance in the Beloved—greater discoveries of God's love—and greater depths of grace and glory in Jesus shall be enjoyed. Your communion with God shall be closer, and more the fruit of adopting love in your heart. Your feet shall be as hinds' feet, and you shall walk on high places. Your peace shall flow as a river, and your righteousness as the waves of the sea. Sorrow shall wound you less deeply—affliction shall press you less heavily—tribulation shall affect you less keenly—all this, and infinitely more, will result from your deeper knowledge of Jesus.
WHEN HIS BEAUTY IS SEEN
O what a Savior is Jesus Christ! He is the chief among ten thousand! Look at His sinless, yet real humanity—without a single taint, yet sympathizing with us in all our various conditions—our afflictions—our temptations—our infirmities—our griefs. Now that He is in glory, He is still cherishing a brother's heart, bending down His ear to our petitions—ever standing near to catch our sighs—to dry our tears—to provide for our needs—to guide us by His counsel—and afterwards to receive us to glory!
O what a Savior is Jesus Christ! When He is known, all other beings are eclipsed. When His beauty is seen, all other beauty fades. When His love is felt, He becomes supremely enthroned in the affections. To know Him more, becomes the one desire of the renewed mind, and to make Him more known, is the one aim of the Christian life. O what a Savior is Jesus Christ!
YOUR ALMIGHTY FRIEND!
Because Jesus is the Almighty God, His people have an Almighty Burden-Bearer. We are a burdened people. Every believer carries a burden peculiar to himself. What is your burden, O believer? Is it indwelling sin? Is it some natural infirmity of the flesh? Is it a constitutional weakness? Is it some domestic trial? Is it a personal or relative trial? Is it the loss of property? Is it the decay of health? Is it soul anxiety? Is it mental despondency?
Come, oppressed and burdened believer, ready to give up all and sink! Behold Jesus, the Almighty God, omnipotent to transfer your burden to Himself, and give you rest! It is well that you are sensible of the pressure—that you feel your weakness and insufficiency—and that you are brought to the end of all your own power. Now turn to your Almighty Friend, who is the Creator of the ends of the earth—the everlasting God, who does not faint, neither is weary.
Oh, what strength there is in Jesus for the weak, and faint, and drooping of His flock! You are ready to succumb to your foes, and you think the battle of faith is lost. Cheer up! Jesus, your Savior, friend, and brother, is the Almighty God, and will perfect His strength in your weakness. The battle is not yours but His! Jesus sustains our infirmities—bears our burdens—supplies our needs— and encircles us with the shield of His Almightiness! What a Divine spring of consolation and strength to the tired and afflicted saint is the Almightiness of Jesus. Your sorrow is too deep—your affliction too heavy—your difficulty too great for any human to resolve. It distances in its intensity and magnitude the sympathy and the power of man.
Come, you who are tossed with tempest and not comforted. Come, you whose spirit is wounded, whose heart is broken, whose mind is bowed down to the dust. Hide for a little while within Christ's sheltering Almightiness! Jesus is equal to your condition. His strength is almighty! His love is almighty! His grace is almighty! His sympathy is almighty! His arm is almighty! His resources are infinite, fathomless, measureless! And all this Almightiness is on your side, and will bring you through the fire and through the water. Almighty to rescue, He is also your Brother and Friend to sympathize. And while His Divine arm encircles, upholds, and keeps you—His human soul, touched with the feeling of your infirmities, yearns over you with all the deep intensity of its compassionate tenderness.
THE ASTONISHING, THE MARVELOUS LOVE!
The cross of Jesus inspires our love to Him. It would seem impossible to be brought by the Holy Spirit to the foot of the cross, and not feel the inspiration of love. Surely a believing apprehension of the amazing, the unparalleled love of Jesus, bending His look of forgiveness upon us from the cross, will thaw our icy hearts into the warmest glow of affection. Believe that Jesus loves you, and your heart shall glow with a love in return which will bear it on in a willing obedience and unreserved surrender, in faithful service and patient suffering, enwrapped, consumed amid the flames of its own heaven inspired and heaven ascending affection. The astonishing, the marvelous love, He has exhibited in giving you His beloved Son to die in your stead, are cords by which He would draw your loving heart to Himself.
BECAUSE HE LOVED HER!
Jesus sustains no association to His Church more expressive than that of the marriage relationship. From all eternity He forever betrothed her to Himself. He asked her at the hands of her Father—and the Father gave her to Him. He entered into a covenant that she would be His. The conditions of that covenant were great, but not too great for His love to undertake. They were, that He should assume her nature, discharge her legal obligations, endure her punishment, repair her ruin, and bring her to glory! He undertook all, and He accomplished all, because He loved her! The love of Jesus to His Church is the love of the most tender husband. It is single, constant, affectionate, matchless, wonderful. Jesus sympathizes with her, nourishes her, provides for her, clothes her, watches over, and indulges her with the most intimate and endearing tenderness.
ETERNALLY REPOSE YOUR WEARY SOUL IN THE BOSOM OF JESUS
Forward, believer in Christ, to the toils, duties, and trials of another stage of life's journey! Jesus is enough for them all. Jesus will be with you in them all. Jesus will triumphantly conduct you through them all. Beloved one, live in the constant expectation of soon seeing Jesus face to face—conversing with He whom here below, cheered, comforted, and sweetened many a weary step of your Christian pilgrimage. That moment is speeding on. In a little while and all that now wounds and ruffles, tempts and pollutes, will have disappeared like the foam upon the billow, and you shall eternally repose your weary soul in the bosom of Jesus!
THE SOLITARY OBJECT OF HIS LOVE!
It is a great mercy when we can retire from the crowd and deal with God individually—when we can take the precious promises to ourselves individually—when we can repair to Jesus with individual sins, infirmities, and sorrows—feeling that His eye bends its glance upon us—His ear bows down to us—His hand is outstretched to us— His whole heart absorbed in us as though not another petitioner or sufferer offered a request, or unveiled a sorrow. As if, in a word, we were the solitary object of His love!
His invitation to you is, "Come unto Me." He would have you come. You cannot honor Him more than recognizing His personal relation to yourself, and disclosing your personal circumstances, making personal confession of personal sin, presenting personal needs, and unveiling personal infirmities, backslidings, and sorrows.
CHRIST MUST BE ALL!
We cannot keep our eye too exclusively or too intently fixed on Jesus. All salvation is in Him. All salvation proceeds from Him. All salvation leads to Him. And for the assurance and comfort of our salvation we are to repose believingly and entirely on Him. Christ must be all! Christ the beginning—Christ the center—and Christ the end.
Oh sweet truth to you who are sensible of your poverty, vileness, and insufficiency, and of the ten thousand flaws and failures of which, perhaps, no one is cognizant but God and your own soul! Oh, to turn and rest in Christ—a full Christ—a loving Christ—a tender Christ, whose heart's love never chills, from whose eye darts no reproof, from whose lips breathes no sentence of condemnation! Christ must be all!
THAT FRIEND!
"There is a friend that sticks closer than a brother." Proverbs 18:24
The power of human sympathy is amazing, if it leads the heart to Christ. It is paralyzed, if it leads only to ourselves. Oh, how feeble and inadequate are we to administer to a diseased mind, to heal a broken heart, to strengthen the feeble hand, and to confirm the trembling knees! Our mute sympathy, our prayerful silence, is often the best exponent of our affection, and the most effectual expression of our aid.
But if, taking the object of our solicitude by the hand, we gently lead him to God—if we conduct him to Jesus, portraying to his view the depth of His love, the perfection of His atoning work, the sufficiency of His grace, His readiness to pardon, His power to save, the exquisite sensibility of His nature, and thus His perfect sympathy with every human sorrow—we have then most truly and most effectually soothed the sorrow, healed the wound, and strengthened the hand in God.
There is no sympathy, no love, no gentleness, no tenderness, no patience, like Christ's! Oh how sweet, how encouraging, to know that Jesus sympathetically enters into my afflictions—my temptations—my sorrows—my joys. May this truth endear Him to our souls! May it constrain us to unveil our whole heart to Him, in the fullest confidence of the closest, most sacred, and precious friendship. May it urge us to do those things always which are most pleasing in His sight.
Beloved, never forget—let these words linger upon your ear, as the echoes of music that never die—in all your sorrows, in all your trials, in all your needs, in all your assaults, in all your conscious wanderings, in life, in death, and at the day of judgment—you possess a friend that sticks closer than a brother! That friend is Jesus!
AS THOUGH IT HAD NEVER BEEN!
Beloved, soon, O how soon! all that now loads the heart with care, and wrings it with sorrow—all that dims the eye with tears, and renders the day anxious and the night sleepless, will be as though it had never been! Emerging from the entanglement, the dreariness, the solitude, the loneliness, and the temptations of the wilderness, you shall enter upon your everlasting rest, your unfading inheritance, where there is no sorrow, no declension, no sin, no sunset, no twilight, no evening shadows, no midnight darkness—but all is one perfect, cloudless, eternal day, for Jesus is the joy, the light, and the glory thereof!
WHAT IS HEAVEN?
Beloved, what is heaven? What is the final glory of the saints? Is it not the best place, the richest inheritance provided by the Father for the people ransomed and brought home to glory by His Son? Heaven is a place designated by God, chosen and consecrated by Him for the Church redeemed by the precious blood of His dear Son. And when we enter there, we shall enter as children welcomed to a Father's home! It will be the best that God can give us! He will bestow upon us, who deserved the least, the best in His power to bestow—the best Savior, the best robe, the best banquet, the best inheritance.
In the new heaven and the new earth there will be nothing more to taint, nothing more to sully, nothing more to embitter, nothing more to wound—no serpent to beguile, no Eve to ensnare, no spoiler to destroy, no sin to defile, no adversity to sadden, no misunderstanding to alienate, no tongue to defame, no suspicion to chill, no tear, nor sickness, nor death, nor parting. It will be the best part of the pure, radiant, glorified universe which God will assign to His people! Saints of the Most High!
Let the prospect cheer, sanctify, and comfort you! It will not be long that you are to labor and battle here on earth. It is but a little while that you are to occupy your present sphere of conflict, of trial, and of sorrow. The time is coming—oh, how fast it speeds! Soon the Lord Jesus Christ will bring you home to heaven!