CHAPTER VIII.02

V. Yet we do not perceive how necessary this obedience is [pg 633] to us, unless we at the same time reflect on the great wantonness of our flesh to shake off the Divine yoke, as soon as we have been treated with a little tenderness and indulgence. The case is exactly the same as with refractory horses, which, after having been pampered for some days in idleness, grow fierce and untamable, and regard not the rider, to whose management they previously submitted. And we are perpetual examples of what God complains of in the people of Israel; when we are “waxen fat,” and are “covered with fatness,”1851 we kick against him who has cherished and supported us. The beneficence of God ought to have allured us to the consideration and love of his goodness; but since such is our ingratitude, that we are rather constantly corrupted by his indulgence, it is highly necessary for us to be restrained by some discipline from breaking out into such petulance. Therefore, that we may not be made haughty by an excessive abundance of wealth, that we may not become proud on being distinguished with honours, that we may not be rendered insolent by being inflated with other advantages, mental, corporeal, or external, the Lord himself, as he foresees will be expedient, by the remedy of the cross, opposes, restrains, and subdues the haughtiness of our flesh; and that by various methods, adapted to promote the benefit of each individual. For we are not all equally afflicted with the same diseases, or all in need of an equally severe method of cure. Hence we see different persons exercised with different kinds of crosses. But whilst the heavenly Physician, consulting the health of all his patients, practises a milder treatment towards some, and cures others with rougher remedies, yet he leaves no one completely exempted, because he knows we are all diseased, without the exception of a single individual.

VI. Moreover it is necessary that our most merciful Father should not only prevent our infirmity for the future, but also frequently correct our past offences, to preserve us in a course of legitimate obedience to himself. Wherefore in every affliction we ought immediately to recollect the course of our past life. In reviewing it, we shall certainly find that we have committed what was deserving of such chastisement. Nevertheless the exhortation to patience must not be principally founded on a consciousness of sin. For the Scripture furnishes a far better consideration, when it informs us, that in adversity “we are chastened of the Lord, that we should not be condemned with the world.”1852 Therefore, even in the bitterness of tribulations, it becomes us to acknowledge the clemency and benignity of our Father towards us; since even then he ceases [pg 634] not to promote our salvation. For he afflicts, not to ruin or destroy us, but rather to deliver us from the condemnation of the world. This idea will lead us to what the Scripture inculcates in another place: “My son, despise not the chastening of the Lord, neither be weary of his correction; for whom the Lord loveth he correcteth, even as a father the son in whom he delighteth.”1853 When we recognize the rod of a father, is it not our duty rather to show ourselves obedient and docile children, than contumaciously to imitate desperate men, who have been hardened in their transgressions? God loses us, unless he recalls us after our defections from him; so that the apostle correctly remarks, “If ye be without chastisement, then are ye bastards, and not sons.”1854 We are extremely perverse, therefore, if we cannot bear with him, while he declares his benevolence towards us, and his great concern for our salvation. The Scripture points out this difference between believers and unbelievers; the latter, as the slaves of an inveterate and incurable iniquity, are only rendered more wicked and obstinate by correction; the former, like ingenuous children, are led to a salutary repentance. You have to choose now in which number you would prefer to stand. But having treated of this subject elsewhere, I shall conclude, contenting myself with having thus briefly touched on it here.

VII. But it is a source of peculiar consolation when we suffer persecution “for righteousness' sake.”1855 For we ought then to reflect how greatly we are honoured by God, when he thus distinguishes us with the peculiar characteristic of his service. I call it persecution for righteousness' sake, not only when we suffer in defence of the gospel, but also when we are molested in the vindication of any just cause. Whether, therefore, in asserting the truth of God, in opposition to the falsehoods of Satan, or in undertaking the protection of good and innocent men against the injuries of the wicked, it be necessary for us to incur the resentment and hatred of the world, by which our lives, our fortunes, or our reputation, may be endangered,—let it not be grievous or irksome to us thus far to employ ourselves in the service of God; nor let us imagine ourselves to be miserable in those respects in which he has with his own mouth pronounced us blessed. It is true, that poverty, considered in itself, is misery; and the same may be said of exile, contempt, imprisonment, ignominy; finally, death is of all calamities the last and worst. But with the favour of our God, they are all conducive to our happiness. Let us therefore be content with the testimony of Christ, rather than with the false opinion of the flesh. Thus we shall rejoice, [pg 635] like the apostles, whenever he shall “count us worthy to suffer shame for his name.”1856 For if, being innocent and conscious of our own integrity, we are stripped of our property by the villany of the wicked, we are reduced to poverty indeed among men, but we thereby obtain an increase of true riches with God in heaven; if we are banished from our country, we are more intimately received into the family of God; if we meet with vexation and contempt, we are so much the more firmly rooted in Christ; if we are stigmatized with reproach and ignominy, we are so much the more exalted in the kingdom of God; if we are massacred, it opens an entrance for us into a life of blessedness. We ought to be ashamed of setting a lower estimation on things on which the Lord has attached such a great value, than on the shadowy and evanescent pleasures of the present life.

VIII. Since the Scripture, therefore, by these and similar instructions, affords abundant consolation under all the ignominy and calamity which we sustain in the defence of righteousness, we are chargeable with extreme ingratitude if we do not receive them from the hand of the Lord with cheerful resignation; especially since this is the species of affliction, or the cross, most peculiar to believers, by which Christ will be glorified in us, according to the declaration of Peter.1857 And contumelious treatment being to ingenuous minds more intolerable than a hundred deaths, Paul expressly apprizes us, that not only persecutions, but reproaches await us, “because we trust in the living God.”1858 As in another place he directs us by his example to go through “evil report and good report.”1859 Nor are we required to exercise such a cheerfulness as to banish all sense of bitterness and sorrow; the saints could discover no patience under the cross, unless they were tormented with sorrow and harassed with grief. If there were no hardship in poverty, no agony in diseases, no distress in ignominy, no horror in death,—what fortitude or moderation would be displayed in regarding them with absolute indifference? But since each of these, by its own essential bitterness, naturally preys on all our hearts, herein the fortitude of a believer is manifested, if, when he experiences such bitterness, how grievously soever he may be distressed by it, yet by valiantly resisting, he at length overcomes it; his patience displays itself, if, when he is sharply provoked, he is nevertheless restrained by the fear of God from any eruptions of intemperance: his cheerfulness is conspicuous, if, when he is wounded by sadness and sorrow, he is satisfied with the spiritual consolation of God.