Trials and discomforts!

(Octavius Winslow, "Morning Thoughts")  LISTEN to Audio!  Download Audio

"There is therefore now no condemnation to those who are in Christ Jesus." Romans 8:1

How strong the consolation flowing from this truth to the believer in Jesus! 'No condemnation' is the ground of all comfort to the suffering Christian!

God may afflict you, but He will never condemn you.

Chastisements are not judgments.

Afflictions are not condemnations.

Sickness, bereavement, and poverty, you can welcome and patiently bear. The fiery trials which purify our faith have not a spark in them of that "unquenchable fire" that will consume the condemned hereafter!

Oh, what are the trials and discomforts of this present world—if at last we are kept out of Hell!

And oh, what are the riches, and honors, and comforts of this life—if at last we are shut out of Heaven!

At the bottom of that cup of sinful pleasure which sparkles in the worldling's hand, and which with such zest and glee he quaffs—there lies eternal condemnation! The death-worm feeds at the root of all his good!

But at the bottom of this cup of sorrow, now trembling and dark in the hand of the suffering Christian, bitter and forbidding as it is—there is no condemnation; eternal glory is at the root of all his evil.

Christian, your whole life ought to be: a sweetly-tuned psalm, a continual anthem of thanksgiving and praise pouring forth its swelling notes to the God of your salvation; since beyond the cloudy scene of your present pilgrimage, there unveils the light and bliss of celestial glory, on whose portal you read as you pass within—No Condemnation!