Bearing
All With Resignation To God’s Will
“We
must bear our daily afflictions with submission to His will; we are bid to
expect trouble in the flesh, something or other happens every day that grieves
us, something in our relations, something in our callings, events concerning
ourselves, our families or friends, that are matter of sorrow: perhaps we have
every day some bodily pain or sickness: or, some cross and disappointment in
our affairs; now in these we must wait upon God. Christ requires it of all His
disciples, that they take up their cross daily (Matt 16:24). We must not
willfully pluck the cross down upon us, but we must take it up when God lays it
in our way, and not go a step out of the way of duty either to it, or to miss
it. It is not enough to bear the cross, but we must take it up, we must
accommodate ourselves to it, and acquiesce in the will of God in it. Not, this
is an evil, and I must bear it, because I cannot help it; but this is an evil,
and I will bear it, because it is the will of God.
We
must see every affliction allotted us by our heavenly Father, and in it we must
eye His correcting hand, and therefore must wait on Him to know the cause
wherefore He contends with us, what the fault is for which we are in this
affliction chastened: what the distemper is to be by this affliction cured,
that we may answer God’s end in afflicting us, and so we may be made partakers
of His holiness. We must attend the motions of providence, keep our eye upon
our Father when he frowns, that we may discover what His mind is, and what the
obedience is we are to learn, by the things that we suffer. We must wait upon
God for support under our burdens; must put ourselves into, and stay ourselves
upon the everlasting arms, which are laid under the children of God to sustain
them, when the rod of God is upon them. And Him we must attend for deliverance;
must not seek to extricate ourselves by any sinful indirect methods, nor look
to creatures for relief, but still wait on the Lord, until that He have mercy
on us; well content to bear the burden until God ease us of it, and ease us in
mercy (Psa. 123:2). If the affliction be lengthened out, yet we must wait upon
the Lord, even when He hides His face (Isa. 8:17), hoping it is but in a little
wrath, and for a small moment (Isa. 54:7, 8).”
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“We
must expect the tidings and events of every day, with a cheerful and entire
resignation to the divine providence. While we are in this world, we are still
expecting, hoping well, fearing ill: we know not what a day or a night, or an
hour will bring forth (Prov. 27:1), but it is big with something, and we are
too apt to spend our thoughts in vain about things future, which happens quite
differently from what we imagines. Now in all our prospects we must wait upon
God. Are we
in hope of good tidings, a good issue? Let us wait on God as the giver of the
good we hope for, and be ready to take it from His hand; and to meet Him with
suitable affections then when he is coming toward us in a way of mercy.
Whatever good we hope for, it is God alone, and His wisdom, power, and goodness
that we must hope in. And therefore our hopes must be humble and modest, and
regulated by His will; what God has promised us, we may with assurance promise
ourselves, and no more. If thus we wait on God in our hopes, should the hope be
deferred, it would not make the heart sick, no not if it should be
disappointed, for the God we wait on, will over-rule all for the best; but when
the desire comes, in prosecution of which we have thus waited on god, we may see
it coming from His love, and it will be a tree of life (Prov. 13:12).”
-Matthew Henry from A Method For Prayer Expositor, Commentator, Minister 1662-1714; Published by Christian Focus Publications Scotland
2007
