When I contemplate a choice thought or two in my mind, I
wonder that ever I can have a downcast countenance for all the trials which
can befall me in the world. To be delivered from wrath, and destined to
glory—is a composing, a silencing thought! When I have a tooth-ache but for
one night, and keep tossing and tumbling from side to side with the
excruciating pain, how long the night appears! But what, then, must the
everlasting night of wrath be—that eternity of woe? Had I a due sense of
divine vengeance—I would think myself happy in the midst of my bitterest
afflictions—if I might entertain the sweet hopes of being delivered from the
wrath to come!
Dare I, then—who has made myself obnoxious to the
irrevocable sentence of an angry Judge—complain of the chastisement of a
Father? Am I displeased that in providence he sits as a refiner of my
graces—when in justice he might be a consuming fire to devour me? Can I cry
out of passing through the fire and water of affliction—when he might set me
up for his mark, cause his arrows to enter into my soul, and the poison
thereof to drink up my spirits through eternity? Should I complain of
trouble and pain—who deserves to be tormented day and night forever and
forever? Dare I be disconsolate under the loss of relations—who might have
been chained through all ages with the fraternity of devils, with whom I had
joined in rebellion against God?
Alas! what shall I say? What can come upon me, that I can
justly complain of—when I am delivered from the wrath to come? Could I look
into the burning lake, and see the tortures of the damned, how would I bless
the most miserable condition of the world, and embrace the bitterest
afflictions—if sweetened with the hopes of escaping that place of torment?
If faith, divinely bold, on solid grounds, can claim the
heavenly inheritance—what in the world can make me miserable? To be
delivered from everlasting flames, should afford me a lasting joy in the
midst of every and any sorrow. Has Jehovah dealt so kindly with my eternal
duration, and will I, dare I—quarrel with his conduct of my few moments of
time? The griefs that vex me are short lived—but the anguish he has rescued
me from is everlasting! Under all my temporal adversities, it should make me
silent—that I shall not roar out under his avenging hand forever. And it
should turn my murmurings here into a song—that I shall not howl hereafter
in eternity!
He who escapes out of his house when on fire, will not
much mind stubbing his to in his flight. So if I escape the wrath to come—it
does not matter if my way lies over thorns of trouble, and briers of
adversity. The soul which is delivered from the pit of corruption, should
with pleasure walk the rough way of affliction towards the paradise
of God.
Moreover, the God who delivers us out of hell, and bears
us to heaven, cannot but bless by the way. He can even bless with crosses,
(flesh and blood cannot believe this,) benefit with adversities, enrich with
losses, and nourish with disappointment and pain.
Therefore will I, without reserve, cast onto his good
pleasure—all the transient moments of my life—to be distributed as he
pleases—since he has rendered my eternity happy and glorious!