affliction

I watched this video earlier, was somewhat fascinated by it, wondering how it was going to end. And also because some years ago, it could have been written by me. Thought about posting it at first as an encouragement to the survivors of abuse, as it struck me perhaps it was written from that angle. The girl in the video, who wrote the poem or text, keeps talking about how people always care, lots and lots of them, and how you don’t have to cope alone. That is not always true, its not been true for me for a very long time now, though I have friends, they are far away. But, there is also another common hyperbole in this poem or text, that the person considering suicide has low self-esteem, and a low opinion of themselves. Actually, that is not true, it is what we have been led to understand in by the psychiactric movement all pervading our lives as far as us knowing the diagnoses and causes of so-called mental illness, it is one of the great myths of our age. Yet, people considering or about to take their own life, are actually experiencing the very opposite of low self-esteem. They are hurting, without a doubt, but the reason they are considering taking their own life, is because they believe they deserve better in life than they have; better from people, or just better from life in general, which actually indicates quite high-self esteem, that they think more or themselves than perhaps other people do, and they think they deserve better.
Friends, you, I, and everyone is deserving of hell. Anything we have above that, is a manifold blessing and a reason to praise God in thankfulness.
I could understand where the author was coming from, having felt every thing she wrote at one time or another. Yet, the thing I have disagreed with in this post are still true.
Of course, some of us are dying a long, agonizingly painful death alone; albeit slowly. And when you have no loved ones or dependants, a perfect scenario has been made for euthanasia. And yes, in the last few year at times that has seemed a viable option, perhaps the only option, open to me. But no: yes, I feel my aloneness deeply at times, till it cut like a knife and pierces my heart and till it feel so tortuous while so sick, that it feels like a knife in my heart and that I can’t stand it another moment; but, friends are the answer as the video suggests? Well, friends and loved ones are a blessing, and are part of the solution and answer no doubt, as we all need people, none of us are an island. But the only lasting answer, or complete answer, is the love of Jesus Christ.
My days are hard at times, when my illness increases and the isolation in such phsyical suffering feels like it will send me insane. And at those times, I do not in all honesty, know how to not feel all I feel, not yet at least. Yet, at any other time but those times, when still suffering beyond what most people can imagine, in illness, and still all alone, except for my cat, depite the gravity of the suffering, through the love of Christ and the power of His Spirit, I have honestly been enabled to say at any other times, and mean it with my whole heart, that HIS grace is sufficient, the Lord is my portion, and that I have learned to be content whatsoever my condition. All except those times above, I would say this is true for me.
Yes, Euthansia or self-murder has seemed an option at times, who wouldn’t it do to anyone in a similar boat? But, if you learn to be content whatsoever one’s condition, then no matter one’s condition, you can say along with Paul, also, that to live is Christ, to die is gain. [2 Cor 12:9; Phil. 4:11; Psalm 73:26; Phil. 1:19-23; Phil. 3:8-9;]

To close this post with another video, yet unlike the first one, this one is through the eyes of faith:

I needed to read these words today:

2 Corinthians 1:9

By this scripture I was made to see that if ever I would suffer rightly, I must first pass a sentence of death upon every thing that can be properly called a thing of this life, even to reckon myself, my wife, my children, my health, my enjoyment, and all, as dead to me, and myself as dead to them. The second was, to live upon God that is invisible, as Paul said in another place; the way not to faint, is to “look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
—John Bunyan

I had to have Poppy, that little sweet bundle that the world rejected and mistreated till I had her at twelve and a half years old, put to sleep. She was 15, and was not happy any longer and was almost continuously ill. It was the kindest thing to do. I only had her two and a half years, yet she came on a mission from God of that much I have been sure for a long time, and she accommplished it, and left her footprints all over my heart, by how she had always been mistreated, and yet didn’t seem to have an evil or aggressive bone in her body, but was utterly sweet and a gentle, kind soul But she’s not suffering any longer.

As for the Bunyan quote I have lost my health, ad ME-anie my younger cat is all I have now in this world as far as “family” or loved ones, at least in my physical world. So, I needed to be reminded of that quote, as several months ago, I made a choice, that I was willing and ready to let Pops go when the time came, even though I have so little, believing that if I am left with nothing at all, not health, or any pet or any human, that the Lord can still accomplish the good work he started. Doesn’t mean I am not sad, or grieved, that that sweet little bundle is no longer here. She was special, there’s no doubt about it. And she’ll be in my heart as long as I live.

Rest well, my sweet Poppy

This song has long resonated with me. As I have always made friends easily, yet, nothing in this world is permanent, and one thing that becomes plainer to me by the day almost, when as ill as I am, and all alone, apart from my two cats, is this world is not my home. I am an alien and a stranger here in more ways than most, and very ltitle to tie me to it. God keeps me here for a purpose that much I know, but very little do I have to make me want to stay here, apart from chronic and severe suffering day in and day out; and the worst of that suffering, even though the illness can be beyond words to describe how bad it can get, is forever the lonliness, and feeling no one I know can understand most things about me, my life, so that I am left feeling like the little alien no one understands.

I love and I laugh, and I love deeply when I do.  Probably one of those folk who loves too much. I think the way my cats thrive with me, especially the oldest one against all reason, shows that. As they get the greatest share of my love day to day.  But at the end of the day, I feel like the little hobo in the song, who makes friends, wherever they go, and always has done,  but, has no real resting place in this world.  Below the lyrics I shall include the video of the song too:

There’s a voice that keeps on calling me
Down the road, that’s where I’ll always be.
Every stop I make, I make a new friend,
Can’t stay for long, just turn around and I’m gone again

Maybe tomorrow, I’ll want to settle down,
Until tomorrow, I’ll just keep moving on.

Down this road that never seems to end,
Where new adventure lies just around the bend.
So if you want to drive me for a while,
Just grab your hat, come travel light, that’s hobo style.

Maybe tomorrow I’ll want to settle down,
Until tomorrow, the whole world is my home.

So if you want to join me for a while,
Just grab your hat, come travel light, that’s hobo style

Maybe tomorrow, I’ll want to settle down,
Until tomorrow, I’ll just keep moving on.

Maybe tomorrow, I’ll want to settle down,
Until tomorrow, I’ll just keep moving on.

There’s a world that’s waiting to unfold,
A brand new tale no-one has ever told.
We’ve journeyed far far and know it wont be long;
We’re almost there, and we’ve paid our fare with our hobo song.

Maybe tomorrow, I’ll want to settle down,
Until tomorrow, I’ll just keep moving on.

So if you want to join me for a while,
Just grab your hat, come travel light, that’s hobo style.

Maybe tomorrow, I’ll find what I call home, Until tomorrow, you know I’m free

It seems to me, that what sets the puritans apart, from the majority, is spiritual maturity, which is sadly lacking in our world today. They didn’t have the comfort and ease that we can so oft easily indulge in today.  And tho they enjoyed the good things in life, in a temperate manner, they times of recreation or leisure was not set apart as separate from the rest of their Christian life. They were Christians all the time. Whether in the home, in the world, in their secular callings at work, at play, as well as in the church. They took the Bible exhortation literally, of whatever we do, do all to the glory of God. But there were no lines of separation in their lives, all of life, was a life of faith, and setting  God before their eyes no matter the time, occasion, place or event. This very firmly, IMO, sets them apart from most today. And it is why we so need their teachings in our world today, because we have much we can learn from them still, and until we do,  and return to the old paths that they trod, I do not believe the church will ever get her glory back.

The puritans sealed their faith as history testifies too, so often with their blood. They were a suffering people, and prepared to suffer even unto death. It is very easy for us to believe we would do the same, when it is unlikely to ever be anything we have to face as a reality. But until the church matures from its current state, over-all at least, you can take those who say they would be glad to pay the cost of their blood or suffering for Christ as just what it is, that of talk. And talk is always, always cheap and easy.   The pruitans were a doing people. Including that of sealing their testimonies with their blood all too often. They had an ongoing, furnace experience. Is this the reason for their maturity, that we lack today? Perhaps it is. These men (and women) were spiritual giants, yet, too often we only experience Spiritual dwarfism today. May the God of Heaven, give us the same heart, spirits, and quest for God, that these men lived out, to leave a testimony that IMO, by mere men, has never been surpassed.

As George Whitefield was to write:

Ministers never write or preach so well as when under the cross; the Spirit of Christ and of glory then rests upon them. It was this, no doubt, that made the Puritans…such burning and shining lights. When cast out by the Black Bartholomew Act [the 1662 Act of uniformity] and driven from their respective charges to preach in barns and fields, in the highways and hedges, they, in an especial manner, wrote and preached as men having authority. Though dead, by their writings they yet speak; a peculiar unction attends them to this very hour.
—-George Whitefield From the Preface of a Reprint of John Bunyan’s works.

Any of you relate to the genie in the bottle of grief?

You can go on for weeks, months, and barely give the source of the grief a thought; you make a deliberate choice to not dwell on it, not think about it, so that you can just get on with your life to the glory of God, as best as you can. But then, its brought to  mind one way or another, and the wound once re-opened is like the genie in the bottle you can’t stop back up.

It is a common theme in Christian history, that well known historical figures lost their mothers when very young, and it is often the case, that their mothers were deeply devout, and pious women, who in the few short years into their own lives lived, exerted a strong influence over their sons.  John Calvin, John Bunyan, and John Newton to name just three that come to Mind. Calvin lost his mother when he was six, Newton when he was seven, and Bunyan, when  a little older. The one name of course recognized throughout the Reformed world is Monica, mother of Augustine.

The little bit I read of Joseph Hall’s mother, resonated with me. As it is often the case, that the suffering are thought to be of no use, of no account, and quite set aside from those more prosperous and are left to languish. Yet, it is often the case, that those who  have been in the school of Christ, the school of very severe suffering,  have insights into spiritual things, that prosperity clouds from view.  Joseph Hall’s memory of his mother, seemed to confirm this also.

As Robert Browning wrote in his well known “Walked a Mile”

I walked a mile with Pleasure,
She chattered all the way;
But left me none the wiser
for all she had to say.

I walked a mile with Sorrow
and ne’er a word said she
But oh the thing I learned from her
When Sorrow walked with me.

I want to quote a little excerpt from the Life of Joseph Hall by the Rev. James Hamilton. Hall  was born on July 1, 1574.

His mother, Winifred Bambridge, was the Monica of Bishop Hall. A body always feeble and often anguish-stricken, was the appropriate tenet of a spirit sorrowful and sorely exercised. But happily the clouds which at one time shaded the piety of this excellent woman, did not render it forbidding to the more genial temper of her son. He rejoiced in the light when others would have complained of the halo, nor refused to be conducted to the Kingdom by a guide whose countenance was sometimes sad, And he at last had the satisfaction of seeing her set free from these vexing thoughts, and deriving the joy of a religion of hope. “What with these trials, so had she profited in the school of Christ, that it was hard for any friend to come from her discourse no whit holier. How often have I blessed the memory of those divine passages of experimental divinity which I have  heard from her mouth! What day did she pass without a large task of private devotion, whence she would still come forth with a countenance of  undissembled mortification. Never any lips have read to me such feeling lectures of piety; neither have I known any soul that more accurately practiced them than her own. Temptations, desertions, and spiritual comforts, were her usual theme; her life and death were saint-like”

John Cowper, the infidel who his brother William won for Christ became an esteemed minister of the Gospel. Nearing the end of his life, severe and protracted pain were his companion, yet, he turned to his brother William, during his last days, and said:

Brother, I am as happy as a king.

Now it belongs not to  my care
Whether, I die or live;
To love and serve Thee is my share
And this Thy grace must give.

If life be long, I will be glad
That I may long obey;
If short, yet why should I be sad,
That shall have the same pay?

Christ leads me through no darker room
That he went through before;
He that into God’s Kingdom comes,
Must enter by this door.

Come Lord, when grace hath made me meet,
Thy blessed face to see;
For if Thy work on earth be sweet,
What will Thy glory be?

My knowledge of that life is small;
The eye of faith is dim;
But it’s enough that Christ knows all;
And I shall be with Him.
—Richard Baxter from his “Poetical Fragments.”

Baxter who was plagued with ill health, pain and various ailments from his youth up, lived the above out in life and ultimately to his death. He didn’t have a comfortable time in his suffeirng either; his persecutors, the king and government of the time saw to that.  He outlived his beloved wife by ten years, and in some ways, he suffered more after her passing, than he did during their life together.. He wasn’t allowed to be ill or die in comfort either. But, for a man wracked with pain and ill health,.from his youth up, not only the minstry he conducted at Kidderminster  under which minstry almost the whole town of Kidderminster was converted, and at various places in London, he also turned out a 128 full length works, which would take more time than most of us would have to be able to read them all, let alone write them. And in earlier life, he had also been a physician to his flock,  science and medical  knowledge being something he had been educated in. He couldn’t abide to see a suffering people, especically when money was often the barrier that kept them suffering.   Of his 128 books, a pastor today could live comfortably forever off the back of those books. But Baxter always asked for payment in kind. Rather than 10% royalties he asked for a copy of his book for every ten sold, so that he could give freely that copy to  any needy soul he came across.  He gave his all in this life, when his state of health would put many folks today, when comfort has become the idol fo the age, in bed and unable, but not Baxter,  because he knew there was a far better city than this ahead, and because he kept his mind in heaven, and on Christ, so that the world, and its persecutions, and hardships it caused him, and his ever suffering body, was always raised to “able” by the height of his mind being in heaven, and far above this , sin filled, darkened world.

Whatever one thinks about some of Baxter’s theology there is no doubt he was and still is, mightily used of God. He is in my opinon, the quintessential example of grace being the great equalizer when he was in many ways little more than a confused Arminian. Holy Baxter was what he was called, because his mind and thoughts were always elevated up to and in heaven. And it is this blog writers opinion, that no one, past or present writes about or on Heaven as Baxter did.
Yet the book that most stands out as his outstanding work on heaven, was the first volume he penned, The Saint’s Everlasting rest, and it is still continuing to bless the saints through their weary pilgrimage on this earth. It was said of him he preached as a dying man to dying men, and yet what made for this disposition, character, and quite outstanding character of holiness?
It was borne out of much physical suffering and illness, right from his youth upwards, but particularly after battling for several months and lingering near death. To quote from Marcus Loane’s book, The Maker’s of Puritan History:

He had been close enough to the margin of things unseen before, now it seemed.as though there could be no return. He lay in the shadow of death for some weeks and he seldom awoke without thinking that dawn had come for the last time. He felt that die he must; yet he prayed that it might be in the will of God for him to be restored. He could not know that he was in fact to lead a long life before the end would be in sight. Meanwhile, his prayers were heard. “Blessed be that mercy that heard my groans in the day of my distress, and granted my desires, and wrought my deliverance when men and means failed.” slowly, gently, with unfailing sympathy and unwearied devotion, he was nursed back to health. Rous Lench was an ideal retreat where he could drink in the tonic of  fresh country air as winter yielded to spring. Five months of such care and convalescence allowed  him at last to return home to Kidderminster. This was in June, 1647, and the kindness of his hosts still followed him in abundance. But he was still in great weakness, and he seldom spent an hour that was free from pain.

Baxter once said that while he was in health he had never thought of writing books or trying to serve God in any other way than preaching. But he did not return from the gates of death until with long look and rapt gaze he had viewed the land  where is the rest that remains for the people of God. He had no books but his Bible and concordance, but his heart burned within him as he mused on that theme. He began to transcribe his thoughts while at Kirkby Mallory, and his notes grew during the five months which he spent at Rous Lench Court. The task was finished shortly after his return to Kidderminster, and the marginal citations were filled in when he came home to his books. Thus he brought out a large volume with the title of the Saint’s Everlasting Rest. It was his first attempt to write a book, and its success would mark it out as a worthy parent of “all those which after followed.” It had the ring of maturity and understanding and experience which could not be denied, and it taught him that the “transcript of the heart hath the greatest force on the hearts of others.”

The book is at once a dirge on the sufferings of a fugitive life in this world and a Psalm on the hope and glory of the world to come.. We can still watch by the bed, where he lay wracked with pain and fever, wishing by night that it were morning, and by day that it were night. We can still catch the shrill sound of controversy in the camp or field and we can hear the voices that throb now with party passions, now with lofty ideals. “I know the best are but negligent loiterers and spend not their time according to its worth and yet he that hath a hundred years time and loseth it all, live not so long as he that hath but twenty and bestows it well. It is too soon to go to hell at a hundred years old, and not too soon to go to heaven at twenty. The woes of earth are but a foil for the joys of heaven, and hoped kindle into rapture at the thought of the rest of the saints in glory. Yonder twinkling stars that shining moon, the radiant sun, are all but as the lanterns hanged out at thy Father’s house to light thee while thou walkest in the dark streets of the earth. But little dost thou know, ah, little indeed, the glory and blessed mirth that is within! The human trust that answers to divine love shines through an exclamation that is also rich in humility. ‘Though I cannot say as Thy apostle, Thou knowest that I love Thee, yet I can say, Lord, Thou knowest that I would love Thee.’ There is scarcely a page  which lacks its gem of thought or phrase, it is indeed as William Bates declared in his Funeral sermon ‘a book for which multitudes will have cause to bless God forever.’ An example of that multitude, we may cite the case of Henry Martyn who wrote in his journal: December 28th 1803; ‘That blessed man, Baxter, in his Saints Rest, was enabled to kindle such a degree of devotion and love as I have long been a stranger to.” Thus his illness gave birth to a classic of true devotional literature, a book which will endure as long as men require a star of hope in a  world of tears and trouble.
–Marcus Loane (who was also quoting singifncantly Baxter)

I think Baxter, along with myself, can sing the same Psalm as David, Psalms 119:71 It is good for me that I have been afflicted; that I might learn thy statutes.

This small poem appealed to me; most days now, for most of the day, except for typing, I don’t use anything more than one thumb, on the hand control of my electric wheelchair, and my brain. It is very minutia periods of any day that it is otherwise.
I consider myself one of those weak, foolish things of the world that Scripture speaks of, (1 Cor. 1:27) and that His strength is made perfect in my weakness. (2 Cor. 12:9)
Yet we are a vain people, and we often judge a book by it’s cover. Someone looking upon someone as unable as me, many would write off, and in fact have done. God gave me the dignity back that makes this life endurable, many times more than that, but joyous even that being tossed by the wayside as a disabled person, one of the “little men” made for. And this from Sir. Richard Baker’s Medititations and Disquisitions, from the memorial introduction, really says it quite nicely.

Little Men. Skorne not the strength of men of little size;
Whom nature makes lesse strong,she make more wise.
Slight not small statures; tis not said in vaine,
The lesser head,the better is the braine.
Marke Natures course,and you shall finde
she puts her choicest wine in runlets,not in buts.
Despise not little men;tis Natures guise
To give the greater sight to lesser eyes
Nature is wise,and gives not all to one;
To some more braine,to others greater bone
Marke inward worth,and you shall findit then
That lesser bodies make not lesser men.

Afflictions are preparing for us a “more abundant entrance,” a weightier crown, a whiter robe, a sweeter rest, a home made doubly precious by a long exile and many sufferings here below. However desperate our earthly warfare may be, it is not forever. No, it is brief, very brief. Its end is near, very near. And with the end come triumph, and honor, and songs of victory. Then, too, there follows peace, and the return of the war-worn soldier to his quiet dwelling. This is the joy of the saint. He has fought a good fight, he has finished the course, he has kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for him the crown of righteousness. His battle is over, and then for him there are rest and home. Home! Yes, home! And what a home for us to return to and abide in forever! A home prepared before the foundation of the world. A home in the many mansions. A home nearest the throne and heart of God. A home
whose peace shall never be broken by the sound of war or tempest. A home whose brightness shall never be overcast by the remotest shadow of a cloud. How solacing to the weary spirit to think of a resting-place so near, and that resting-place our Father’s house where we shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more, where the sun shall not scorch us, nor any heat, where the Lamb that is in the midst of the throne shall feed us and lead us to living fountains of waters, and God Himself shall wipe away all tears from our eyes

We are now but as wayfaring men, wandering in the lonely night, who see dimly upon the distant mountain peak the reflection of a sun that never rises here, but which shall never set in the “new heavens” hereafter. And this is enough. It comforts and cheers us on our dark and rugged way. It would not be enough hereafter, but it is enough just now. This wilderness will do for us until we cross into Canaan. The tent will do until the eternal city comes. The joy of believing is enough until we enter on the joy of seeing. We are content with the “mountain of myrrh, and the hill of frankincense,” until “the day
breaks and the shadows flee away.”
—-Horatius Bonar

First of all I apologize for the length of this blog post; it’s a story in history that is very dear to me; Queen Joanna you can find lots of websites telling you of her apparent “madness.” Yet this poor, perfectly sane woman, spent 50 of her 76 years on earth, imprisoned, because the men who should have most protected her, Father, husband, son, all conspired against her, because she had such revulstion at the barbaric and cruel atrocities being perpetrated by the Roman Church. She was tortured, and never swayed from the truth. And was kept in a dungeon, with only a candle, with her own filth never being cleared up, her body covered in tumours towards the end of her life, after being on the rack and other forms of barbarism, ordered by her own family, because she rejected the Roman Catholic church. And she seems a figure that time has either forgotten, or the truth has become so distorted she is viewed as a crazy women, who needed to be protected from herself. But the truth is a very different story. As Merle D’aubigne tells in his History of the Reformation in the times of Calvin, book 14, the last chapter tells.

(BORN 1479; DIED 1555.)

AMONG the victims immolated in Spain, in the Netherlands, and elsewhere, by the fanaticism of Charles the Fifth and his subordinates, there was one, the most illustrious of all, whose history had been long hidden by a mysterious veil. This was his mother, Queen Joanna, the daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella. The veil has been partly lifted in our days by the discovery of some documents in the archives of Simancas. Although the information is not yet complete, and perhaps may never be so, it is nevertheless possible now to get some glimpses of the mysterious drama which darkened the life of this unfortunate princess. Few histories are more astonishing than the history of this woman, whom we see by some tragic destiny connected with three executioners — her father, her husband, and her son. These three men, king Ferdinand, the archduke Philip, and the emperor Charles the Fifth, whom she never ceased to love, and whom God had given her for protectors, deprived her of her kingdoms, cast her into prison, and had the strappado inflicted on her.’ f193a To complete their infamy, they circulated a report that she was mad. She displayed remarkable intelligence, and in this respect she would have taken high rank among princes, far above her father and her husband, if not above her son. The latter derived from her, certainly not from his father, his great abilities. Some celebrated physicians having been summoned by the Comuneros to inquire whether the alleged madness existed, and having interrogated the officers and servants who were about her, cardinal — afterwards Pope — Adrian, one of her gaolers, gave the emperor an account of the inquiry in these words: ‘Almost all the officers and servants of the queen assert that she has been oppressed and forcibly detained in this castle for fourteen years, under pretense of madness, while in fact she has always been as sound in mind and as rational as at the time of her marriage.’ f194 The desire to possess themselves of the supreme power incited these three unworthy princes to deprive Joanna and to keep her in shameful captivity.

It was to her, and not to her father Ferdinand, that the kingdom of Castile belonged after the death of Isabella. It was to her, and not to her husband Philip, nor afterwards to her son Charles, that the Spains, Naples, Sicily, and other dominions belonged. She was deprived of all by these traitorous princes, and received in exchange a narrow prison.

Joanna, the daughter of Ferdinand of Aragon and Isabella of Castile, was born in 1479, and was brought up in Spain under the care of her mother.

Although it was not in those days the custom of the court, as it was in the time of Philip II, to attend the auto-de-fe, the whipping and the torture of heretics, these exploits of fanaticism done to the honor of Jesus Christ and his holy mother were nevertheless at this epoch the favorite subject of conversation of that devout court. The prison, the whip, the real and the stake, were the commonplaces of their intercourse. The compassionate heart, the sound understanding, and all the good instincts of the young girl rebelled against these excesses of the Roman faith and it was soon discovered that there was in her mind an opposition to the favorite notions of her mother, and a deep feeling against these punishments. It was a great grief to Isabella to see her own daughter wantonly ruining herself; for was it not her eyes ruin to doubt of the holiness of the proceedings of the Inquisition? She, therefore attempted to stifle the first germs of disobedience, She did not shrink from extreme measures to bring Joanna to a better mind. The marquis of Denia, chief gaoler of the unhappy prisoner, wrote to Charles the Fifth, on January 26, 1522, as follows: ‘If your Majesty would employ torture against her, it would be in many respects rendering service to God and at the same time doing a good work towards the queen herself. This course is necessary with persons of her disposition; and the queen, your grandmother punished and treated in this way her daughter the queen, our sovereign lady.’

When Joanna had attained the age of seventeen her father and mother began to think about a marriage alliance for her; and it is easy to understand that she was eager to accept the hand of the archduke of Burgundy, one of the handsomest knights of his age. The prince was to conduct her to the Netherlands, of which he had been sovereign since 1482, and thus he would withdraw her from the teaching of her mother.

Joanna’s readiness was very natural under the circumstances.

Soon after her arrival in the Netherlands it was observed that feelings to which the cruelty of the Inquisition had given birth in her noble heart were developing themselves — indignation against the persecutors, and love for the persecuted. It is known that in these parts were to be found some of the Vaudois, the Lollards, and the Brethren of the Common Life, all alike inspired with a true religious spirit. The fresh information which Joanna now received strengthened her previous impressions of hostility to Roman superstition. The Catholic Isabella, alarmed at the reports which reached her, sent to Brussels the sub-prior of Santa Cruz, Thomas de Matienzo, to see what the facts were, and to arrest the evil. The princess, who tenderly loved her mother, was cast down on hearing of her displeasure, and tears started to her eyes. But her resolution did not give way. The sub-prior took all possible pains to draw from Joanna some answer to the questions which Isabella had charged him to ask. He was very coldly received; and on Assumption Day, when two of the confessors of the princess presented themselves for the purpose of receiving her confession, she declined their services in the very presence of her mother’s envoy. Her former tutor, Friar Andrew, who felt much anxiety for the soul of his pupil, entreated he to dismiss certain Parisian theologians, who seem to have been more enlightened than the majority of the priests, but whom Friar Andrew called drunkards. At the same time he begged the princess to supply their place by taking for her confessor a good Spanish monk. But all his entreaties were fruitless. Nothing could overcome the repugnance which she felt towards the Roman religion. On several occasions she refused its rites, but she did not advance nor take any active steps. Her strength was passive only.

On February 24, 1500, Joanna gave birth to a son, who was to become the emperor Charles the Fifth. Conspicuous amongst the magnificent presents offered to the young prince was the gift of the ecclesiastics of Flanders, who laid before him the New Testament, splendidly bound, and bearing the inscription in letters of gold — Search the Scriptures.

Isabella was deeply distressed to see her daughter thus drifting away from Spanish orthodoxy. It was not a complete rebellion; Joanna did not openly profess all the doctrines called in Spain heretical. But the queen had ordered hundreds of her subjects to be burnt for slighter opposition than that of the princess. Would Isabella’s devotion to the Virgin go so far as to sacrifice to it her daughter? Even had she desired it, it would not have been easy; for Joanna as the wife of a foreign prince, was emancipated from her mother’s control. Besides, it must well be believed that Isabella would not have committed such a crime. Still, the question arises, would she allow a heretic to ascend the throne of Castile?

Would she expose the Inquisition, an institution so dear to her, to the risk of being suppressed by the princess who was to succeed her? Never. Her whole being revoked against such a thought. The priestly party rejoiced to see these scruples of the queen, and endeavored to increase them. King Ferdinand himself, Joanna’s father, but not a tender-hearted father, felt that it was for his own interest to embitter more and more the feeling of her mother.

As early as 1502 Isabella’s plan was formed. She would keep the heretic Joanna from the throne which belonged to her after her own death. On the meeting of the Cortes, at Toledo, in 1502, and at Madrid and Alcala de Henares, in 1503, the queen caused to be laid before them a project of law by virtue of which the government of Castile should belong after her death to Ferdinand, in case of Joanna’s absence, or of her unwillingness or inability personally to exercise the rights which belonged to her. This resolution was voted by the Cortes, and was inserted by Isabella in her will, in which she set forth the conditions which she had at first laid down.

The pope confirmed the arrangement. Thus was Joanna to be set aside from succession to the throne which belonged to her on account of her opposition to the Inquisition and to other Roman practices. But Isabella took care not to state this, because she perceived that such an avowal would be dangerous. The priesthood and the holy office were almost universally detested, and, therefore, it, was necessary to avoid asserting that they were the cause of the exclusion of Joanna, for this would have rallied to her cause the majority of the nation. Some pretext must, however, be found. It should be reported that she was mad. This is nothing but the truth. thought the priests. Is it possible that anyone not mad would reject Rome and her decrees, and put in their place some other senseless doctrines?

In 1504 Isabella died. Ferdinand publicly announced to the people, assembled in front of the palace of Medina del Campo, that although the crown belonged to his daughter he should continue to govern during his lifetime. Joanna and Philip, her husband, were still in the Netherlands. It appeared that Joanna bore with meekness this robbery of the crown by her father; but it was otherwise with her husband. Philip energetically protested against this act of spoliation. ‘Ferdinand,’ he said, ‘has put into circulation a false report of the madness of his daughter and other absurdities of the like kind solely with a view to furnish himself with a pretext for seizing her crown.’ It has generally been stated that it was Philip’s mother who had caused the madness of his widow. But this report, it is evident, was already in circulation at a time when she had, without contradiction, the full possession of her reason. We have seen from what source the report came, and the interest which her father had in causing it to be believed.

In 1506 Philip, accompanied by Joanna, arrived in Spain for the purpose of assuming himself the power which his father-in-law had usurped. The majority of the people soon declared themselves on the side of Joanna; and Ferdinand, in a fit of anger was on the point of encountering his son-in-law with capa y spada, intending to plunge his sword into his bosom. But he observed ere long that a party was forming, and was becoming more and more numerous, at the head of which was the constable of Castile, whose object was to set aside both Philip and Ferdinand, and to place the legitimate queen on the throne. Ferdinand was perplexed, finding that he had two rivals, his son-in-law and his daughter. It was clear to him that Joanna, as Infanta and lawful heiress, would easily win all the hearts of the people, and that Philip, as a foreigner and usurper, would find it hard to gain acceptance. He resolved, therefore, to unite with Philip against his own daughter. He gave him an appointment to meet him at Villafafila, on June 26 (1506). The king determined to assume an appearance of amiability. He took with him only a small number of attendants, dressed himself plainly, mounted an ass, and thus arrived in the presence of his son-in-law with the air of a gallant country gentleman, an amiable smile upon his lips, and saying that he came ‘with love in his heart and peace in his hands.’ Philip received him attended by a considerable number of grandees of the Netherlands and of Spain, besides a large body of men-at- arms. Philip himself, who was surnamed the Handsome, was in the pride of his youth and strength. Ferdinand having dismounted from his ass and saluted his son-in-law, begged him to follow him alone into the church. All the members of their suite were forbidden to accompany the two princes, and guards were stationed at the entrance to prevent anyone from penetrating into the church. There, at the foot of the altar, these two traitorous men were about to conspire to ruin, the spoliation, and we might saw the death of their innocent victim, daughter of one of them and wife of the other. The interview began. The sentinels were able occasionally to catch glimpses of the two princes, and even to hear their voices, but they could not understand what they said. Ferdinand spoke much and with animation; Philip made only short answers and at times seemed to be embarrassed. The father-in-law pointed out to his son-in-law that Joanna was on the point of being placed on the throne by the people, and that both of them would thus be deprived of it; that they ought to exclude her, and that they would assign as their motive that she was incapacitated for reigning by reason of ‘here malady,’ which propriety did not permit them to name. It is evident that the reference was to the alleged madness. Whether Philip, who lived with Joanna, and knew her real state, had also protested against this false accusation, gave way at once, we cannot tell. However this may be, Ferdinand, who for a long time had not seen his daughter, succeeded in persuading his son-in-law to adopt this pretext. It likewise appears that there was already some talk about imprisoning the queen. While Ferdinand thus sacrificed his daughter, he felt no scruple about deceiving his son-in-law. An agreement was concluded between the two conspirators that the government of Castile should belong to Philip; and in the instrument signed the same day it was alleged that Joanna refused to accept it herself. Meanwhile the courtiers were awaiting the two princes; and the guards having reported the visible animation and eloquence of the father-in-law, it was expected that he would come away triumphant. Great, therefore, was the astonishment when it became known that he had yielded everything to his son-in-law.

Thus the story of the madness of Joanna, first invented in the interest of Rome, was confirmed by her father, by her husband, and afterwards by her son Charles the Fifth, in their own interest, and with a view to despoil her of the crown of Spain, of Naples, Sicily, and her other dominions.

But what is to be thought of Ferdinand’s concession? It was a mere piece of acting. His ass, his modest suite, his plain unarmed arrival, had been nothing but a comedy, the object of which was to put him in a position to allege that he had fallen into the hands of his son-in-law, and that the latter had compelled him to sign the agreement. He immediately prepared a secret protest, in which he declared that Joanna was kept prisoner by Philip on false pretenses, and that he considered it his duty to deliver her and to place her on the throne. He then set out for Naples, delegating as his representative with Philip his well-beloved Master Louis Ferrer, who enjoyed his entire confidence, desiring him to look after his interests. He had hardly set out when, after an illness of three or four days, Philip died.

The current rumor was that he had been poisoned. Some persons declared that they knew he had received a dose of poison in his food (bocado.) But the scandal of a trial was dreaded, and the matter was hushed up. The guilty Ferdinand remained master of the situation. Joanna had been placed in confinement by her husband immediately after the interview of Villafafila, After the death of Philip, Ferrer took possession of her. Several princes, particularly Henry VII of England, aspired to the hand of this widow, heiress of several kingdoms; but Ferdinand hastened to write in all directions that to ‘his great vexation’ his daughter could not possibly think of a second marriage. This gradually gave wider currency to the fable of her madness.

The queen was then at Burgos, and it was determined to remove her thence to Tordesillas, where they intended to keep her in confinement. Philip had died at Burgos, and his body was to be transferred to Granada, to be there interred in the sepulchre of the kings. This involved a journey from the north to the middle of Spain, and Tordesillas lay on the road. The scheme was to have the queen set out at the same time as the body of her husband.

One and the same escort would thus serve for both. It has been supposed that there might be financial reasons for this arrangement. In our days, it has been said, no one would ever think of such economy. But at that time the want of money was incessantly obtruding itself, and people might be well pleased to save a thousand scudos. This conjecture is admissible, but there were other reasons. The journey was made slowly. On two or three occasions the queen was removed from one place to another by night. But it is of little moment whether the journey from Burgos to Tordesillas was made by night or by day. In any case it was a strange spectacle, the grand funeral car, with its dismal but splendid accompaniments, and after these the carriages of the captive queen, about whom the most extraordinary reports were already in circulation. It been stated that the death of Philip had cost Joanna the loss of her reason; it has been said that had so much affection for her husband that she to have his body always near her, as if it were still living; that she was jealous even of her husband, and would not allow her women approach his corpse? f198a It was rumored at the time that the queen, watching for the moment of his return to life, refused to be separated from the lifeless; and this very journey was referred to as an proof of her madness. But these allegations are belied by facts. As the tomb at Granada as not yet ready, the body of Philip remained for years in the convent of St. Clara at Tordesillas and the queen did not once go to see it nor did she even express a wish to do so.

She used to of Philip as any faithful wife would speak of her deceased husband. Her excessive tenderness for Philip, who had behaved infamously towards her, her resolution never to be separated from his corpse — these are fables of modern history, invented by those were determined to deprive her of her rights to thrust themselves into her place.

Joanna arrived at Tordesillas under the guardianship of Ferrer, the man who, it was believed, had poisoned her husband. The palace was a plain house, situated in a barren country; the climate was scorching in summer and very severe in winter. Joanna was confined here in a narrow chamber, without windows, and lighted only by a candle; she was not allowed to walk, even for a few minutes, in a corridor which looked out upon the river. She was thus refused a liberty accorded even to murderers. She was there, without money, attended by two female keepers, and unable to communicate with the outer world.

The mother of Charles V continued to show in the prison of Tordesillas her dislike to the Roman ceremonies. She refused to hear mass; and the main business of her keepers was to get her to attend it. The cruel marquis of Denia, count of Lerma, who succeeded Ferrer, endeavored to compel the queer to practices which she abhorred. ‘There is not a day passes,’ he wrote, ‘on which we are not taken up with the affair of the mass.’ f198b At length the queen consented to attend mass, at the end of the corridor either from fear of the scourge, the pain of which she knew, or perhaps in order not to sunder herself from the religion of Spain, of which she constantly hoped to be acknowledged as queen. But when they brought her the pax, the paten which the priest offers to great persons to kiss, she refused it, and commanded it to be presented to the Infanta her daughter, whom they had not yet taken away from her.

At Christmas 1521 matins were being sung in the chapel which had been fitted up at the end of the corridor. The Infanta alone was present.

Suddenly Joanna appeared, wretchedly attired for a queen. She did not attend the mass herself, and even wished to prevent her daughter from attending it. She interrupted the service, ordered with a voice that reechoed from the walls that the altar should be taken away and everything else that was used in the religious ceremonies, and then laying hold of her daughter she dragged her away from the place. Nothing could at this time bend her; she resolutely refused to attend mass or any other Catholic services. In vain did the marquis of Denia entreat her to conform to the Roman practices; she would not hear of such a thing. ‘In truth,’ wrote the marquis to Charles V, ‘if your majesty would apply the torture (premia), it would be doing service to God and to her highness.’ f199 The mother of Charles V was plunged into the deepest melancholy by the treatment to which she was subjected. Her days were a constant succession of sorrows. Her passage through life was from one suffering to another. All her desire was to get out of that horrible prison; and in striving to attain this object she displayed much good sense, earnestness, and perseverance. She begged the marquis of Denia to allow her to quit Tordesillas, at least for a time. She wished to go to Valladolid. She alleged as a reason the bad air she breathed and the acute sufferings it caused her.

Her health required a change of air, and she must at least undertake a journey. Her deep feeling moved her barbarous gaoler himself. For a moment pity touched that heart of stone. ‘Her language is so touching,’ wrote Denia to the emperor, ‘that it becomes difficult for the marchioness and myself to withstand her appeals. It is impossible for me to let anyone go near her, for not a man in the world could resist her persuasion. Her complaints awaken in me deep compassion, and her utterances might move stones.’ This is not how Denia would have written to Charles if he had been speaking of a mad woman. Moreover he requested him to destroy his letters. At times she remained silent; and we know that the grief which does not utter itself is only the more fatal to the sufferer. At other times her distress broke forth. One day (April 1525) she contrived to find access to the corridor and filled it with her sighs and moanings, shedding the while floods of tears. Denia gave orders immediately that she should be taken into her narrow chamber, so that she might not be heard. At the same time he wrote to Charles V: ‘I have always thought that in her highness’s state of indisposition, nothing would do her more good than the rack; and after this that some good and loyal servant of your majesty should speak to her. It is necessary to see whether she will not make any progress in the things which your majesty desires.’ By these things he means confession, the mass, and other Roman rites.

In 1530, despairing of seeing the queen confess, ‘I cannot believe,’ he wrote, ‘that so fortunate a thing can happen. However I will use all needful endeavors.’

The officers of Charles V, and the monks who had incessantly labored for the conversion of Joanna to Romanism, multiplied their efforts as her death approached. She withstood their pressing entreaties to receive the rites, the symbols of the papacy, and people heard the cries which she uttered while they put her to torture. She would have neither confession nor extreme unction.

Had Joanna become acquainted with the Reformation and the writings of the Reformers, and with the doctrines which they professed? This has been doubted; but it seems improbable that she should have been ignorant of them. Joanna was a Lutheran, says one of the learned writers who have devoted most attention to this subject. This statement is perhaps too definite. But the evangelical doctrines were penetrating everywhere; and they must have reached the prison of Joanna. It has been asserted that Luther at this time had more numerous adherents in Spain than in Germany itself. The keepers of the prison perhaps prevented evangelical works from reaching the queen. There is, however, a light which no hand of man can intercept. The theologian de Soto celebrated for his acquirements, as well as for his piety, came to her on the morning of her death; and he appears to have thought her a Christian, but not a Roman Catholic. He said: ‘Blessed be the Lord, her highness told me things which have consoled me.’ Here is the Christian. He adds: ‘Nevertheless, she is not disposed to the sacrament of the Eucharist.’ Here is the enlightened woman who rejects the rites of Rome. ‘She committed her soul to God,’ said the princess Joanna, granddaughter of the queen, ‘and gave thanks to Him that at length He delivered her from all her sorrows.’ Her last words were: ‘Jesus Christ crucified, be with me .’ She breathed her last on April 12, 1555, between five and six o’clock in the morning.

Thus died the mother of Charles V at the age of seventy-six years. She had been at various times kept in prison by her husband, Philip of Austria; for ten years by her father, Ferdinand the Catholic; and for thirty-nine years by her son, the emperor Charles V. She is a unique example of the greatest misfortunes, and her dark destiny surpasses all the stories of ancient times. The heiress of so many famous kingdoms, treated as the most wretched of women, was in her last year strictly confined in her dungeon, and lay in the midst of filth which was never removed. Covered as she was with tumors, in anguish and solitude, can we wonder that strange and terrifying images were sometimes produced in her brain by her isolation, melancholy, and fear? But while she was the victim of the gloomiest fanaticism ever met with in the world, she was consoled in the midst of all these horrors, as her latest words prove, by her God and Father in heaven.

The time has come for posterity to render to her memory the compassion and the honor which are her due.

The last few days I have been reading John  Bunyan’s small treatise,  “Seasonable Counsel or Advice to sufferers,” I shall likely finish it to day or tomorrow.  If you are under any afflictions I would recommend it to you, and at just over a hundred pages, easily readable for most folk.  Those of you who know me  a little will know why this excerpt from it spoke to my heart, but it is very true, I bear witness to it being so in my own trials and sufferings.

A Creator! A Creator can not only support a dying cause, but
also fainting spirits. For as he fainteth not, nor is weary, so “he giveth
power to the faint, and to them that have no might he increaseth strength”
(Isa. 40:29). He is the God of the spirits of all flesh, and has the life of the
spirit of his people in his own hand. Spirits have their being from him; he
is the Father of spirits. Spirits are made strong by him, nor can any crush
that spirit that God the Creator will uphold.
Is it not a thing amazing to see one poor inconsiderable man, in a spirit of
faith and patience, overcome all the threatenings, cruelties, afflictions, and
sorrows, that a whole world can lay upon him? None can quailf43 him,
none can crush him, none can bend down his spirit. None can make him to
forsake what he has received of God — a commandment to hold fast. His
holy, harmless, and profitable notions, because they are spiced with grace,
yield to him more comfort, joy, and peace, and do kindle in his soul so
goodly a fire of love to, and zeal for God, that all the waters of the world
shall never be able to quench.
Ay, say some, that is because his is headstrong, obstinate, and one that
will hear no reason. No, say I, but it is because his spirit is in the hand,
under the conduct and preservation, of a Creator. A Creator can make
spirits, uphold spirits, and make one spirit stronger to stand, than are all
the spirits of the world to cast down. To stand, I say, in a way of patient
enduring in well-doing, against all that hell can do to suppress.
—John Bunyan

I had planned for a blog post tonite on the doctrine of election, but after a bolt out of the blue tonite, I have decided to post this instead.
I have long felt perplexed, confusion, even anger, at those Professors of Christ who when I was already dealing with more than enough for anyone to cope with at one time, continued to pile me up in additional afflictions so that at times, I have felt I knew not how to stand. Being sick unto death would be enough to cope with for most people, to die alone, estrange from and abandoned by the church you once loved, and forsaken of humanity in such dreadful illness is another matter entirely, and a cross of great magnitude. Yet for all those who have used their hands against me, I can only think now, forgive them Father, for they know not what they do. They were the instruments to pile me up so high, yet the first cause of anything is always the God of heaven and earth, and by these crosses, whether directly from God of men being used as the instruments to pile them up, through them, I have gained by the grace of God much sanctification, and ultimately, true conversion. Sometimes I have felt like Alexander Peden, the prophet of the Covenant when he said he felt the visible church was trying to shut him out of heaven. in his case however, he was not talking of his covenanting brethren or those of like mind, but of enemies of God and true religion. But God is the first cause of everything that befalls us–good, bad, or indifferent. When men are used as the tools which strike us or afflict us, we must see the affliction as ultimately from the hand of God. The same was true of Herod and pontus Pilate, and like Christ with his persecutors and murderers, the only dignified thing to say is Father forgive them, they know not what they do, whether they are true believers are false professors that remains true.
Sometimes you think things are fine, and out of the blue you get a shock or some insult or sleight, and you feel knocked down. But you will only stay down if you choose to. It is said of William Wilberforce the politician and abolitionist, that the thing that made him notable, was no matter how many times he got knocked down, he always got back up, and stronger. I think affliction works that in you. That you get knocked down so often, you don’t know how not to get back up, because if you do not, you have lost it all. Christ said do not fear those who can kill the body, but those who can kill the soul. We will only lose our souls if we let them be taken or give our consent. When your soul is one of the few things one has left of any worth to you, and you have lost everything and everyone that once mattered to you, as well as your health and freedom, then you are not going to give consent for your souls eternal welfare to be snatched from you, or killed, but we will commit to the Lord for safe keeping, knowing that we are unable to keep it, just as we cannot do a thing in our own strength, but we have a Saviour, and Advocate, an Intercessor who is more than able and more than willing.

1 Peter 4:19 Wherefore let them that suffer according to the will of God commit the keeping of their souls to him in well doing, as unto a faithful Creator.

I will close this blog post with a prayer of George Wishart, whose surely was as his name suggests, wise of heart.

‘O Thou Savior of the World, have mercy upon me! Father of
Heaven, I commend my spirit into Thy holy hands.’ Then he
turned to the people and said: ‘I beseech you, Christian Brethren
and Sisters, be not offended at the Word of God, for the affliction
and torments which ye see prepared for me. But I exhort you, love
the Word of God and suffer patiently, and with a comfortable
heart, for the Word’s sake, which is your undoubted salvation and
everlasting comfort. Moreover, I pray you, show my brethren and
sisters, which have heard me oft, that they cease not to learn the
Word of God which I taught unto them, for no persecutions in this
world, which lasteth not. Show them that my doctrine was no
wives’ fables, after the constitutions made by men. If I had taught
men’s doctrine, I had gotten greater thanks by men. But for the
true Evangel, which was given to me by the Grace of God, I suffer
this day by men, not sorrowfully, but with a glad heart and mind.
For this cause I was sent, that I should suffer this fire for Christ’s
sake. Consider and behold my visage. Ye shall not see me change
my color! This grim fire I fear not: and so I pray you to do, if any
persecution come unto you for the Word’s sake; and not to fear
them that slay the body, and afterward have no power to slay the
soul. Some have said I taught that the soul of man should sleep
until the Last Day; but I know surely that my soul shall sup with
my Savior this night, ere it be six hours, for whom I suffer this.’

Although there are many Christ like Christians today, sadly, there are some who claim to be on the side of Christ and speak words that sound like angels, while becoming the persecutors of the brethren in different ways to days of old, through not caring about our brothers and sisters’ in Christ as we should, neither body or soul, and only our immediate family mattering to us, and the mystical family is degraded into non-importance. Christ said there is no greater love for a man to lay down his life for his brother, and Christ did that for all us unworthy sinners, he loved us when we didn’t love him.  The covenanters in Scotland and the puritans in England risked life and limb to help and assist each other too. When they were turned out of their livings and manses it was not just them, but their wives, children, any other dependants with them, and yet, for the crown of Christ, and those who upheld his name, no cost was too great for Christ or the brethren, sadly, this is not the case in all cases today, as self takes much more precedence over Christ or Christ’s body.

But I loved this  included in John Foxes Acts and monumuments, its referred to as a fable, but I’m not sure how to interpret that, originally written I believe by Clement.

Hear a fable, and yet not a fable, but a true report which was told
us of John the apostle, and has been ever since kept in our
remembrance. After the death of the tyrant, when John was
returned to Ephesus from the isle of Patmos, he was requested to
resort to the places bordering near unto him, partly to constitute
bishops, partly to dispose the causes and matters of the church,
partly to ordain to the clerical office such as the Holy Ghost
should elect. Whereupon, when he was come to a certain city not
far off, (the name of which also some do mention) f927 and had
comforted the brethren as usual, he beheld a young man robust in
body, and of a beautiful countenance, and of a fervent mind, when,
looking earnestly at the newly-appointed bishop: “I most solemnly
commend this man (saith he) to thee, in presence here of Christ and
of the church.”
When the bishop had received of him this charge, and had promised
his faithful diligence therein, again the second time John spake unto
him, and charged him with like manner and contestation as before.
This done, John returned again to Ephesus. The bishop, receiving
the young man commended and committed to his charge, brought
him home, kept him, and nourished him, and at length also did
illuminate, that is, baptized him; and after that, he gradually relaxed
his care and oversight of him, trusting that he had given him the
best safeguard possible in putting the Lord’s seal upon him. The
young man thus having his liberty more, it chanced that certain of
his old companions and acquaintances, being idle, dissolute, and
hardened in wickedness, did join in company with him, who first
invited him to sumptuous and riotous banquets; then enticed him
to go forth with them in the night to rob and steal; after that he was
allured by them unto greater mischief and wickedness. Wherein, by
custom of time, and by little and little, he becoming more expert,
and being of a good wit, and a stout courage, like unto a wild or
unbroken horse, leaving the right way and running at large without
bridle, was carried headlong to the profundity of all misorder and
outrage. And thus, being past all hope of grace, utterly forgetting
and rejecting the wholesome doctrine of salvation which he had
learned before, he began to set his mind upon no small matters.
And forasmuch as he was entered so far in the way of perdition, he
cared not how much further he proceeded in the same. And so,
associating unto him a band of companions and fellow thieves, he
took upon himself to be as head and captain among them, in
committing all kind of murder and felony.
In the mean time it chanced that of necessity John was sent for to
those quarters again, and came. The causes being decided and his
business ended for the which he came, by the way meeting with the
bishop afore specified, he requireth of him the pledge, which, in the
presence of Christ and of the congregation then present, he left in
his hands to keep. The bishop, something amazed at the words of
John, supposing he had meant them of some money committed to
his custody, which he had not received (and yet durst not mistrust
John, nor contrary his words), could not tell what to answer. Then
John, perceiving his perplexity, and uttering his meaning more
plainly: “The young man,” saith he, “and the soul of our brother
committed to your custody, I do require.” Then the bishop, with a
loud voice sorrowing and weeping, said, “He is dead.” To whom
John said, “How, and by what death?” The other said, “He is dead
to God, for he became an evil and abandoned man, and at length a
robber. And now he doth frequent the mountain instead of the
church, with a company of villains and thieves, like unto himself.”
Here the apostle rent his garments, and, with a great lamentation,
said, “A fine keeper of his brother’s soul I left here! get me a horse,
and let me have a guide with me:” which being done, his horse and
man procured, he hasted from the church as much as he could, and
coming to the place, was taken of thieves that lay on the watch.
But he, neither flying nor refusing, said, “I came hither for the
purpose: lead me,” said he, “to your captain.” So he being brought,
the captain all armed fiercely began to look upon him; and eftsoons
coming to the knowledge of him, was stricken with confusion and
shame, and began to fly. But the old man followed him as much as
he might, forgetting his age, and crying, “My son, why dost thou
fly from thy father? an armed man from one naked, a young man
from an old man? Have pity on me, my son, and fear not, for there
is yet hope of salvation. I will make answer for thee unto Christ; I
will die for thee, if need be; as Christ hath died for us, I will give
my life for thee; believe me, Christ hath sent me.” He, hearing these
things, first, as in a maze, stood still, and therewith his courage was
abated. After that he had cast down his weapons, by and by he
trembled, yea, and wept bitterly; and, coming to the old man,
embraced him, and spake unto him with weeping (as well as he
could), being even then baptized afresh with tears, only his right
hand being hid and covered. Then the apostle, after that he had
promised and firmly ascertained him that he should obtain
remission of our Savior, and also prayed, falling down upon his
knees, and kissing his murderous right hand (which for shame he
durst not show before) as now purged through repentance, he
brought him back to the church. And when he had prayed for him
with continual prayer and daily fastings, and had comforted and
confirmed his mind with many sentences, he left him not (as the
author reporteth) before he had restored him to the church again;
and made him a great example of sincere penitence and proof of
regeneration, and a trophy of the future  resurrection.
—John Foxe, “Acts and Monuments” Volume 1

We are taught in our age, that we must all have great self esteem and self worth. It is our right to it. Every time we get a knock in life that hurts, we will feel the hurt like any human being, but part of that hurt, will often be pride, because whoever has brought this hurt into our life, is not or had not treated us as well as we think we deserve to be, on our own esteem of ourselves.

Before I go on in this post, I want to say and make a disclaimer, that in almost anything in life, one cannot put everyone into the same hole. One size never fits all, as we are all individual and all very complex and all very different. There is a very, very tiny, proportion of those who claim to be depressed, and suffering a severe clinical depression, who are in fact suffering illness, there cause without fail will be physical in nature. In both men and women, on of the major causes for depression, and even what we may commonly term as bi-polar, will often be hormonal imbalances. It is not only women who suffer this and it has a negative and detrimental affect on their lives, men do also. Neurological illness also, always leaves a predisposition to depression. In fact, the text book goes that depression is a natural consequence of neurological illness, because obviously the brain and central nervous system is affected in neurological illness, but the text-books read as if it is inevitable, that you cannot avoid it if you have neurological illness, and from personal experience I dispute that point. Again, one size does not fit all. But out out of all the people in the world, on prozac, or anti-psytropic or anti-psychotic medications, the percentage of those who actually are suffering illness is a tiny, tiny fragment. And even if you may read this, and do have some hormonal imbalance, or neurological illness and you may struggle with depression, then please don’t throw your hands in the air thinking that’s it for life, that it has to always be that way–it maybe so and true for some people, but its not a fact that it has to be for all. We should not take it as leave to not address the real issues of what maybe causing our real depression or the greater part of it at least–I talk of course of spiritual malady and spiritual depression, which is not illness, but in a word it is sin. Those of us who do have some legitimate illness that can lead to real depression, will as a natural consequence of that, after a while, also fall foul to spiritual depression additionally, I do believe that is a natural consequence, of one from the other. Suffering, of any kind can and does affect us spiritually. And that’s what I am addressing, not the small percentage of people who suffering from physical illness that causes real depression, but those who only suffering spiritual depression, or those of us who do have illness that causes real depression, but as a consequence of that, also then become spiritually depressed so that it escalates and becomes a vicious cycle that if we are not delivered from it, it will either destroy us, or rule us for the rest of our days, and we shall be destined to be miserable, have no joy in the Lord, and if we have a physical illness, I know from personal experience that its to be fatalistic about it, and see it as a done deal, because we have illness causing a physical depression, so there is little we can do about it, right? WRONG!

King David in the Psalms, is often one of the most depressed, afflicted, tortured, tormented individuals that ever lived. He pours out his heart and complaints constantly. What do you or I do when we sink into a depression through circumstances or affliction? Usually we whine to this person or that person, we may even have hard thoughts of God, and complain of him like the Israelites did in their tents. Yet godly King David, never complains about God, or to other people, he earnestly and honestly, entreats and beseeches his God for favour and deliverance and help in his plight. For him to notice his afflictions, and looking kindly upon him, and to deliver him from his enemies. He is not afraid to express to God the pain he is feeling; he doesn’t always pray exalting God in every word or line, his prayers are earnest and honest, and he pours out his soul pain before God, never complaining of him, or to other people of his situation, but always complaining to God and beseeching his assistance.

Psalm 88 which is not one of David’s is probably the most miserable and depressing Psalm in the whole book of Psalms, yet, I don’t know about you, but often times that has been my soul song. Psalm 73 is another one, again not by David, but, one of a man in a lamentable condition and affliction.

Those Christians who suffer physical illness and a real depression ensues, will need medical intervention, to try and address the physical imbalance in the brain, however it can take weeks for these medications to start to work or become affective to any small degree, and by the time they are starting to, the person by that time is usually spiritually depressed additionally. You ask anyone who has suffered very real depression, through physical causes and then it has led on to spiritual depression, which was the greater burden, and I would be certain that the majority would say the spiritual depression was the greater burden, the one that really lowered them into the depths of despondency and despair. In those cases they have a double affliction, and not one brought on in all cases by their own sins, but because we cannot compartmentalize ourselves into separate little bits, of spiritual, physical, emotion, mental, we are a whole person, and when just one of those thing is out of sync, the others can and often do become affected too.

But what does the Bible teach us about these things? Spiritual depression is very often or most often brought about by the sense of God’s desertion or leaving us, because we are so afflicted its often how it feels. Why doesn’t God come to our rescue otherwise? How many times does David cry out from the depths of his soul, “How long, O Lord.”

Look what God says in Deut 8:1-3 about the forty years of wandering in the wilderness of the Israelites. He did it to HUMBLE them. Humility is the opposite to that of self-esteem, and pride. Self-esteem is nothing but having a proud view of ourselves and what we are entitled to, and how are entitled to be treated. If we think of ourselves as nothing but dust, then we will not have great self esteem and when bad things befall us, we will see that whoever was he instrument God used for it to befall us, it came nonetheless, straight from the hand of God. Men may do the deed, but nothing befalls the Christian without God’s allowing it, for our good and for his glory. When men bring affliction upon us, our habit is to sit and brew and dwell upon the evil act(s) of this person or that person, when we should be going to God, knowing that the man, or woman, the instrument was only the secondary cause, but the first cause of everything, good or bad is from the providence of God. If we see it in this way, and learn to submit to God’s will, whatever circumstances, however hard or hurtful they maybe, we will not need valium, or prozac, we will exercise our faith, and realize that we are the clay and the Potter is doing as he wills with his lump of clay and like Job put our hands over our mouth, rather than repine, or look for a solution in the world of psychiatry to ease the pain we are suffering. Afflictions hurt. No one will say any different. But if we turn to pills rather than to God, to ease that hurt, then we are lacking faith, and distrusting God. The one thing that no one alive will not agree upon, at some stage is that life hurts. We have to get used to that being a fact of life, and that we are not always going to be sat comfortably, or the apple of any ones eye, and it may seem as believers we are not the apple of God’s eyes because of what has befallen us, yet it is to humble us, to fit us for heaven. If we turn to pills, we refuse to be humbled under the hand of God because we regard ourselves far too highly and we want to stop hurting and to get some sense of self esteem back. It’s a great sign of very weak faith, and of great distrust in God. We do not need pills, we need to exercise our faith, little by little. Even when we don’t’ feel it, we need to exercise it, to stir it up within us, until we do start to feel it.

Job suffered loss after loss within a very short time. He was a rich man, a very blessed man, yet in a matter of hours he lost everything he owned, plus his seven children. (Job 1). Yet we are told at the beginning of that Job 1 that he was an upright and righteous man, who eschewed evil, and what was his response when the sons of God brought him bad news after bad news? “The Lord gives and the Lord takes away, Blessed be the Name of the Lord.” Does anyone think that as Job uttered those words he was not an utterly broken man, a sorely afflicted and hurting man? But he was a humble man, and he accepted it as from God’s hand. He didn’t need valium or prozac to help him cope with the grief of it all, his faith was what he needed and his faith is what finally triumphed and exalted God and and he passed the test that God had given permission for Satan to put him too. You see even in Job, we have the devil going before God, and God gives him permission to do with him as he will, and that Job will prove that he was not serving God for his own ends or for what he could get out of God, that he would still serve him and exalt him even when he was stripped bare of everything he owned and loved. Even when his wife and closest friends added to his afflictions, still he clung onto his God. Yes occasionally, he said a phrase or two that in his humanity, to expect anything else would be wrong, as only the Lord Jesus Christ led a sinless life. But today, if all that befell Job, befell us, we would seek pills and counseling, and most likely sink into despair and despondency maybe even to the brink of suicide, because our self esteem has been ripped to shreds by everything we cherished having been snatched from us, and us being left barren and poverty stricken and of course in the case of Job also acutely physically afflicted additionally.

To go back to King David, lets look at Psalm 13. David is on the edge, he’s at the point he may go ever the edge into despair and despondency. Psalm 13:1 David feels that God has forgotten him, that he does not see his plight and wants him to look upon him, upon his plight and deliver him. He doesn’t want a psychiatrist or happy pill, he wants God’s favour to lift him out of the pit he is sinking into.

Vs 2 we see him talking of taking counsel within himself, and how many of us do that when we fall into hard times? So that our thoughts become a torture to us, a state of mental anguish, and the outward manifestation of that would be impossible to tell the difference between someone who is clinically depressed. Yet David did not want doctors, or medicines, only the Great Physician could heal him from his distress and anguish.

Vs 3 he is beseeching God and afraid for his very life. Is suicide perhaps what is being intimated at here? Possibly though we cannot say for certain.

Vs. 4. He calls God as his person to perform his promises, as believers we have every right to have confidence in God performing his promises to us, there is no shame in asking him to do so, in fact to do so, is to pray in faith. This is the verse actually where David’s state starts to turn around and the glimmer of faith among the darkest of times start to show through. BEcause he remembers who God is, and what He has done for him in the past and for His people in general. And that gives room for a chink of hope among the darkness that he is surrounded by.

Vs 5. He tells God how has been a faithful servant, and trusted him; he know to do so again, he shall have once again the joy of his salvation.

And by the time he gets to the final verse, 6, he is positively exalting God’s goodness and bounty, and singing praises to him. Someone told me, that you cannot simultaneously feel suicidal when praising God and David is he epitome of that truth in the last verse of this Psalm given his distress just a few short verses earlier.

Martin Luther wrote about Psalm 13:

This is a prayer full of sighing’s and groaning of an afflicted heart. In the hour of darkness, and almost overwhelmed under that darkness, with extreme grief and sorrow, and driven by the greatest strait of mind.

I’m sure many of us at sundry times can relate to those feelings, though the circumstances be very different. Yet if in those darkest hours, we choose medication when we have no physical reason for our depression, we are lacking both faith and trust in God, and doing it the way of the world rather than God’s way. David humbled himself before God, and knew that he would deliver him in due time.

One other example that cannot be left out, because his words really sum up the whole, is the apostle Paul with his thorn in the flesh. Again, he says it was given him to keep him humble. And therefore it was for his good, and Paul humbled himself before the Lord, after begging 3 times for the removal of it, and his response to this to me personally, are some of the sweetest words of the whole of Scripture

2 Corinthians 12:9 And he said unto me, My grace is sufficient for thee: for my strength is made perfect in weakness. Most gladly therefore will I rather glory in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.

Sufficient grace is what it is all about; and any Christian has sufficient grace for whatever the trial and whatever the circumstance no matter how bad the case may be. Sufficient grace does not need pills like valium, prozac and haldol, as the grace is totally sufficient; something can’t be sufficient if you need something else besides that, unless there is a physical need through physical illness.

His grace is sufficient in the darkest hours, upon the most thorny of beds, and to the Christian, when in an afflicted state its what he needs to beg God for. Because God promises us all, not to give us more than we can bear, that he will always supply the grace we need to make it bearable. Only the Christian can draw on that grace, though it does not act automatically without us also stirring faith up in ourselves, to be able to draw on it and to start to think in faith, which will send the formerly tormented mind by tortured thoughts, into exalting and trusting God in complete faith and trust, knowing that in our faithfulness to God, in whatever dark providence befalls us, the same as David, we know that we will sing to the Lord because he hath dealt bountifully with us, and we will have the joy of our salvation, because his grace will be sufficient to sustain us, until we are delivered from the affliction.

Taking many of the anti-depressants out there, unless there is a real physical need, through physical illness making for the depressed state of mind, will only further cloud our thinking, and rather than helping to solve the problem may well prolong it or make it worse, because we chose worldly remedies instead of trusting God, we refused to be humbled and wanted to feel better and get our self esteem back, so we turned to pills, instead of submitting to the hand of God and humbling ourselves under it.

In Mansoul, which was an allegory by John Bunyan, and Mansoul was his own heart, we read:

For my part, I myself was in the town,
Both when ’twas set up, and when pulling down;
I saw Diablous in his possessing
And Mansoul under his oppression.
Yea, I was there when she own’d him for Lord
And to him did submit with one accord. [John Bunyan]

Turning to pills is submitting to the oppression rather than fighting the fight of faith.

As long term readers may know, one result of my illnesses is serous neurological affect. My Autonomic Nervous system is failing. When I was in the pits of despair and despondency I had every reason to believe there were physical causes that made for it. Yet, I have a personality that is really diametrically opposed to being a depressive, and I have had neurological illness since I was nine years old. Yet every few days Diablous would take possession of my heart and I would submit to it and be almost choking on the oppressiveness I felt. And I can only say in hindsight, since the Lord blessed me with living faith, that nothing has changed about my illness or my circumstances or many afflictions, but I do know and can say with certainty, that faith never allows me to sink into that state of despair and despondency, or suicidal thoughts. His grace really is sufficient with nothing else needed or required.

If any reader has ever read, Bunyan’s Grace Abounding to the Chief of sinners, one of the most annoying things about it, is that you are never sure when he is converted. He seems to go through several conversion experienes, and each one seemed to lead him a little more on the pathway to heaven, but most people do agree of the occassion he spoke of in that autobiography of what was the defining moment of conversion. However, this post is not about Bunyan, so I am not going to quote what seems to have been his defining moment in conversion.
But I also went through a similar path. Of thinking myself converted, wanting to do the right thing, yet always, always failing dismally. I never felt saved, though feelings are never to be trusted wholly. But I confided from the start to my closest friend I didn’t believe I had been converted, even though I had made two professions already by that time at different times. I went through torment and anguish in this spiritual battle, akin to both that of Bunyan and Martin Luther, and it wasn’t a few weeks or months, but six long, hard painful years. The hardest ever of my life. And the last time I made a profession, which would be around 18 months ago, in hindsight I’m still not sure that was my defining moment, but like Bunyan each one led me further on the path to heaven, and I know that sometime in the last 18 months it happened for real. Because the difference I found, in the worst of circumstances and a belly full of afflictions, my perceptions to cope with it, and rise above it in faith, what I always wanted to do, but never could, was suddenly there. YOu cannot be in this much affliction and fake it. But the difference was, when this started to happen, is the power of godliness that Scripture speaks of.

The chains fell off and at once I
was like Bunyan’s Christian in Pilgrim’s Progress:

What a fool I have been, to lie like this in a stinking dungeon, when I could have just as well walked free. In my chest pocket I have a key called Promise that will, I am thoroughly persuaded, open any lock in Doubting-Castle.” “Then,” said Hopeful, “that is good news. My good brother, do immediately take it out of your chest pocket and try it.” Then Christian took the key from his chest and began to try the lock of the dungeon door; and as he turned the key, the bolt unlocked and the door flew open with ease, so that Christian and hopeful immediately came out.—John Bunyan

Bunyan spoke of the often painful experience of conversion in his excellency of a broken heart, And he spoke from experience and it is one I can so relate with. That kind of torment and angush may not be common to everone’s conversion experience but it is to some.

Conversion is not the smooth, easy-going process some men seem to think . . . . It is wounding work, of course, this breaking of the hearts, but without wounding there is no saving. . . . Where there is grafting there is a cutting, the scion must be let in with a wound; to stick it on to the outside or to tie it on with a string would be of no use. Heart must be set to heart and back to back, or there will be no sap from root to branch, and this I say, must be done by a wound. —John Bunyan

Faith, and expeirmental religion, is not just a word its a whole man change and all at once. Yes, someone can be a babe in Christ, and yet the whole man is still changed, and a new convert there most pleasing hours will be spent on meditating on the lovliness of Christ and our best endeavours to please him by being obedient children, will be driving us on to grow in grace and holiness and the power of godliness. Except for it was somewhere in the last 18 months I cannot say when, but I know the change took place. So that my sufferings, and the hauntings of a painful most incredible past, don’t control me, or bring out behavour in me that does not belong in the life of a Christian. The power of godliness is real, and alive, and you cannot fake it in this much affliction, tho that may not be true for most average folks, and even so I still lack assurance, and yet when I read things that is speaking of examining our own hearts, I don’t just feel the checklist kind of thing like I used to do, that never be so blatant for me to say I didn’t pass the questions, there was room for doubt, now even though I am a poor doubting Christian in many respects, I know by every bit of my fibre, that the change God has wrought in me was supenatural and only by the power of godliness could I now rise above this furnace that is seven times hotter to praise God even when in the hottest part of it. Sometimes, despite how ill I am, and how alone in that awful amout of illness, I spend hours thinking about God’s providence and the change he has wrought in me and how he did it. I don’t do it to feel pleased about myself, but his love is so manifest in it, so wondrous to me how he did it, in such extraordinary circumstances, when I did not have the aids, benefits and encouragments or even teaching as other folks get, and with cognitive impairment to boot, I marvel at his works at how wondrous they are, and how nothing can stop him from make those he chose from before the foundation of the world his blessed childen; no hindrances, obstacles, stumbling blocks, or the plagues of our own hearts will stop him, and he will go to extraordinary or unusual means to make this happen if ordinary means are not available. Because God is all powerful and nothing can thwart hsi will. When I think about where I’ve been, what I’ve seen, and lived through, and what a life of terrible affliction I am still left with and yet feel so blessed and so content despite it, that it can only be the power of godliness and I rejoice in my Lord for making it so. I would live a hundred years in this condition if He willed me to, rather than the last six preceding it, where in temporal terms I was actually richer, because God alone is my portion and what a wondrous God he is, to stoop so low to someone like me; the one the world rejected from the day I was born. It makes me weep, but not with sadness, but at the love of a perfect Saviour, for someone who was so rebellious and denied his goodness for so long, because of my afflictons, it makes me weep, that he stooped so low, despite myself. And when the going gets tough, I remember how but for amazing grace, I could be in hell now. Or tomorrow or next week, and remember the wickedness of my own heart and how in such utter torment, I hurt the people I loved most of all. Yes I am forgiven, but I will never forget. Because what such affliction in the middle of the spiritual anguish of never quite closing with Christ had never been part of my personality before, and I loathe what came out of my heart, towards the people who were kindest to me, and least deserving of it. I think its very true that when we are hurting, we really do hurt the ones we love, not because we get pleasure out of it, but because we don’t know how not to.
I was on a roundabout that I couldn’t get off and so wanted it to stop, but I didn’t know how to make it stop, until the power of godliness was put in me by God giving me a through conversion. And yes, this life can be hard, and awefully lonely, but I never weep for my afflictions in any longer without also weeping for my sins.
I had Charles Spurgeon’s Lectures to my student’s come the weekend, and he wrote this:

People go to their place of worship and sit down comfortably and think they must be Christians, when all the time all that their religion consists in, is listening to an orator, having their ears tickled with music, and perhaps their eyes amused with graceful actions and fashionable manners; the whole being no better than what they hear and see at the opera.–not so good, perhaps, in point of aesthetic beauty, and not an atom more spiritual. Thousands are congratulating themselves, and even blessing God that they are devout worshippers, when a the same time they are living in an unregenerate Christless state, having the form of godliness, but denying the power thereof. He who presides over a system which aims at nothing better than formalism, is far more a servant of the devil than a minister of God.
—Charles Spurgeon

Though aimed at ministers it applies to all professors of Christ. People often make rash judgements over another’s soul on the silliest pretext, yet, sometimes judgements can be made and should be made, righteous judgments. If someone has Christ, they will have the power of godliness. They will be living to serve God and not themselves, and following the commandments he gives us in the moral law to stay within his will and keep his favour. What child likes to displease or be out of favour with a parent? If the power of godliness is not there, and you have someone who practices antinomianism, because they do not have the power of godliness to follow the commands of God required of his chosen people, there is a time for either thinking their profession is in vain, or stepping back and thinking it likely they be unsaved despite their profession, but be in wait and see mode, to see if they grow in godliness and if the power of godliness comes through in their lives. If it doesn’t, then there is little reason or rationale to consider them true believers. The power of godliness is not empty or weak or vain. It’s power is saving, its power is changing, and its a power that the believer will be consumed by, even though we all have our dry seasons or seasons of lethargy.
Let us pray we have the power of godliness and do as much as lies in us, to hold onto it, by caring for our souls as carefully as we should, and not being reckless, as often it just takes one small step out of the right way, for you to find yourself completely out of the way. Let us pray for God to keep us, and to give us the power to do, all we need to do, to be true servants of his, truly joined to him, and not only by a profession, without that power of godliness ruling our lives and God and the authority of Scripture being our first and last measure of eveyrthing in life.

Matthew Henry writes this on 2 Peter 1:3

1. An account of the way and means whereby grace and peace are multiplied–it is through the knowledge of God and Jesus Christ; this acknowledging or believing in the only living and true God, and Jesus Christ whom he has sent, is the great improvement of spiritual life, or it could not be the way to life eternal, Joh 17:3.

2. The ground of the apostle’s faith in asking, and of the Christian’s hope in expecting, the increase of grace. What we have already received should encourage us to ask for more; he who has begun the work of grace will perfect it. Observe, (1.) The fountain of all spiritual blessings is the divine power of Jesus Christ, who could not discharge all the office of Mediator, unless he was God as well as man. (2.) All things that have any relation to, and influence upon, the true spiritual life, the life and power of godliness, are from Jesus Christ; in him all fulness dwells, and it is from him that we receive, and grace for grace (Joh 1:16), even all that is necessary for the preserving, improving, and perfecting of grace and peace, which, according to some expositors, are called here in 2Pe 1:3 godliness and life. (3.) Knowledge of God, and faith in him, are the channel whereby all spiritual supports and comforts are conveyed to us; but then we must own and acknowledge God as the author of our effectual calling, for so he is here described: Him that hath called us to glory and virtue. Observe here, The design of God in calling or converting men is to bring them to glory and virtue, that is, peace and grace, as some understand it; but many prefer the marginal rendering, by glory and virtue; and so we have effectual calling set forth as the work of the glory and virtue, or the glorious power, of God, which is described Eph 1:19. It is the glory of God’s power to convert sinners; this is the power and glory of God which are seen and experienced in his sanctuary (Ps 63:2); this power or virtue is to be extolled by all that are called out of darkness into marvellous light, 1Pe 2:9. (4.) In the 2Pe 1:4 the apostle goes on to encourage their faith and hope in looking for an increase of grace and peace, because the same glory and virtue are employed and evidenced in giving the promises of the gospel that are exercised in our effectual calling. Observe, [1.] The good things which the promises make over are exceedingly great. Pardon of sin is one of the blessings here intended; how great this is all who know any thing of the power of God’s anger will readily confess, and this is one of those promised favours in bestowing whereof the power of the Lord is great, Nu 14:17. To pardon sins that are numerous and heinous (every one of which deserves God’s wrath and curse, and that for ever) is a wonderful thing, and is so called, Ps 119:18. [2.] The promised blessings of the gospel are very precious; as the great promise of the Old Testament was the Seed of the woman, the Messiah (Heb 11:39), so the great promise of the New Testament is the Holy Ghost (Lu 24:49), and how precious must the enlivening, enlightening, sanctifying Spirit be! [3.] Those who receive the promises of the gospel partake of the divine nature. They are renewed in the spirit of their mind, after the image of God, in knowledge, righteousness, and holiness; their hearts are set for God and his service; they have a divine temper and disposition of soul; though the law is the ministration of death, and the letter killeth, yet the gospel is the ministration of life, and the Spirit quickeneth those who are naturally dead in trespasses and sins. [4.] Those in whom the Spirit works the divine nature are freed from the bondage of corruption. Those who are, by the Spirit of grace, renewed in the spirit of their mind, are translated into the liberty of the children of God; for it is the world in which corruption reigns. Those who are not of the Father, but of the world, are under the power of sin; the world lies in wickedness, 1Jo 5:19. And the dominion that sin has in the men of the world is through lust; their desires are to it, and therefore it rules over them. The dominion that sin has over us is according to the delight we have in it. MHWBC

I know when my cat poppy dies, I will feel sadness, yet, I have already let her go in a way even as she lives. The same is true of everything and everyone else I love or are important to me. Several months ago, to a friend, my oft complaint was, what I am I supposed to do if I lose poppy, and “Lady Erskine” is still not back, so I have nothing or no one. I always end up in places or new perceptions our outlooks without remembering how it happened, but I do know the last several months, the question above became moot. Yes, poppy is here, and I enjoy her while she is here, yet in a very real way, she is already lost to me. All we have to do, is acknowledge in our heart and understand the reality of everything and everyone in this life is perishable and temporary, and that one day they will die. If they die as we live, we are already to let them go when we don’t just merely assent to that, but hold it deep in our hearts as a fact that is inevitable and are ready for it even if its the next hour. Poppy disappearing on Saturday night was the manner in which I thought she’d died that was so upsetting. Like I had failed her at the end by not making her feel safe or being there to comfort or protect her. But if she died next week, or even tomorrow, there will be sadness, but I have already let her go, even as I love her while she lives., I’m not sure how God enabled me to do that, but I also know its true of other things I love. By the world’s standards I am dirt poor, and poverty stricken; even by most Christian standards, yet as I was just remarking to a friend, to me, I am rich. Because God has enabled me to live upon the invisible God when I have very little else, and I know that has to be where my joy comes from when as ill as this and so little in this world to take the edge off all my afflictions. But even as the things I love live, and I love them as I live, I have also been enabled to pass a sentence of death upon them, and that’s how I am able to live upon God that is invisible, in the worst of circumstances. I thank God for his amazing grace, as these things have made my life enjoyable again, by living on things invisible. I wouldn’t swap my afflictions for all the riches in the world, because this prison has been turned into a palace, that is paved with Gold, and where God abides with me, and my two cats. The riches that the world offers, would be a poor exchange. I have been richer in the past than now, and yet, I remember that emptiness that torment, that anguish that used to feel like it was destroying me. And now when less rich, and with very little to keep me warm in the worst of circumstances and quite dreadful illness, I am fuller than I have ever been in my entire life. We serve an awesome God. And while every living thing in this life is perishable and temporary, God will never leave us or foresake us.

This quote of Bunyan’s that I have posted before, completely nails it. And if we are ever to suffer rightly, when we suffer extremely, it IS the only way to do it. God got me to that place before I first came across this quote. But as soon as I read it, I knew that is what he had done for me, and by grace worked out in my life.
But, I wouldn’t advise folks to wait to do this, until they are in the place of being given the news you have an incurable illness, and perhaps by that time your life partner and spouse maybe already dead. The time to set about, doing the work below, is while we have things and riches to pass a sentence of death upon, so that when faced with the reality of it, it is already embedded in our heart, and we have already let go and have died to everything we currently cherish. I am blessed that God enabled me when at the point already. But if not for his doing so, I would still be drowning in afflictions, with every day an agony or anguish instead of feasting on the invisible God and being filled and rich and the place I once saw as a prison, would not now be the palace it has become. Yet God abides here, so why wouldn’t it be a palace, as that is whrere Kings abide in any case.

if ever I would suffer rightly, I must first pass a sentence of death upon every thing that can be properly called a thing of this life, even to reckon myself, my wife, my children, my health, my enjoyment, and all, as dead to me, and myself as dead to them. The second was, to live upon God that is invisible, as Paul said in another place; the way not to faint, is to “look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
—John Bunyan

Psalms 73:26 My flesh and my heart faileth: but God is the strength of my heart, and my portion for ever.

If our view of God who reigns also included the fact that he is favourably disposed towards us and interested in our welfare, how consoling that would be! Apart from the testimony of his Word, the fact of God’s benevolence appears on every hand! It may be seen in the constitution of our beings, and in his providence. Had God been indifferent to human happiness or disposed to inflict unnecessary suffering, why would he have made a supply of nature for every craving within us? Why the beauty that delights the eye, the music which charms the ear, the air that invigorates, the food which pleases and nourishes? Why the sun and moon to keep time and measure seasons? Why the seasons and the weather that give us our food? The answer is that God cares and provides, that he is good as well as great. And Scripture sets its seal to nature’s testimony. It assures us that ‘God is love,’ that ‘his tender mercies are over all his works,’ that ‘he is good unto all,’ and that ‘he has never left himself without witness, in that he did good, and gave us rain from heaven and fruitful seasons, filling our hearts with good and gladness.’

Surely these considerations should influence us when we meditate on the checkered scene of human life. We are obviously exposed to dangers and have no sure means of escaping them; We cannot predict the future, and all in all, have reason to regard time as a troubled and uncertain sea. Is it not comforting to think that infinite knowledge and wisdom preside over all, and that uncertainty or chance have no place in God’s unchangeable purpose! Again, when actually faced with serious difficulties from which reason can see no hope of escape, surely there is great consolation in the well-grounded thought that the trials are divinely appointed for good reason by the God who has the power to relieve as well as afflict. And when again, we face the problem of suffering, and the apparent uneven distribution of prosperity and adversity–yes when in trouble ourselves and plagued with questions, why?–surely we have reason to restrain our thoughts and feelings with the consideration of God’s infinite rectitude, wisdom and goodness! We are ill-placed to pass judgment on matters involving the principles of Divine government that only the eternal state will disclose.
—James Buchanan

It is not one of the least benefits of severe affliction, that it shatters our confidence in every other stay, and breaks up our hopes from every other quarter, and leads us, in simplicity, to search the Word of God for comfort; nor is it one of the least recommendations of that precious book, that its characters become more bright in proportion as all else around us is dark, and that when all other information becomes insipid or nauseous, its truths are rendered only the more sweet and refreshing by the bitter draught of sorrow. The Bible cannot be known in its excellence, nor its truths relished in their sweetness, nor its promises duly appreciated and enjoyed, until, by adversity, all other consolation is lost, and all other hopes destroyed; but then, when we carry it with us into the fiery furnace of affliction, like the aromatic plant, which must be burned before the  precious perfume is felt, it emits a refreshing fragrance, and is relished in proportion as our sufferings are great. Glorious peculiarity! other books may amuse the hours of ease; other knowledge may suffice to pass the short day of prosperity, but this book only is for the long hour of sorrow; this knowledge comes to my aid when all other knowledge fails; and, like the sweet stars of heaven, the truths of God shine most brightly in the darkest night of sorrow.
—James Buchanan “Comfort in Affliction.”

2 Corinthians 1:9

By this scripture I was made to see that if ever I would suffer rightly, I must first pass a sentence of death upon every thing that can be properly called a thing of this life, even to reckon myself, my wife, my children, my health, my enjoyment, and all, as dead to me, and myself as dead to them. The second was, to live upon God that is invisible, as Paul said in another place; the way not to faint, is to “look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen; for the things which are seen are temporal, but the things which are not seen are eternal.
—John Bunyan

Matt. 6:34

Sometimes I compare the troubles which we have to undergo in the course of the year to a great bundle of fagots, far too large for us to lift. But God does not require us to carry the whole at once; He mercifully unties the bundle, and gives us first one stick, which we are to carry today, and then another which we are to carry tomorrow, and so on. This we might easily manage, if we would only take the burden appointed for us each day; but we choose to increase our troubles by carrying yesterday’s stick over again today, and adding tomorrow’s burden to our load, before we are required to bear it.
—John Newton, “Out of the Depths

If like me, the road seems long, and you feel weary, this is a good thought to start the day with, and to try to remember when we feel overwhelmed, as I for one, very often do.

When a parent loseth a promising child, a child loseth a loving parent, or when death deprives us of any near relation, it is a speaking and trying providence; and we have much need of grace and counsel from God to conduct aright under it. Let us observed these advices:

It is necessary in such a case that we have a tender sense and feeling of God’s afflicting hand. There are two extremes which we must equally avoid, namely to make light of the death of relations, and to be excessively grieved on that account. God will have us neither to despise his rod, nor to faint under it. Heb. 12:5. God is displeased with those who are stupid and insensible under such afflictions. Hence he complains of such: “I have smitten them, but they have not grieved.” Jer. 5:3. God will have us feel his hand, inquire into the meaning of the rod, and search for those sins that have provoked God to smite us. It is a sign of a selfish and unchristian spirit to be unconcerned for the death of friends, and much more is it so in those children who have a secret satisfaction in the death of parents because of worldly riches or liberty, which they get thereby. God often follows this wicked temper with his heavy judgments even in this life.

Consider that God is calling you by the death of others, to keep up lively and lasting impressions of death and eternity upon your own spirits. God knoweth how advantageous it would be for men to do so, and therefore he sets frequent spectacles of mortality before their eyes for this end. But such is the corruption and earthliness of our minds, that we soon forget the thoughts of death. When we see our friends in the pangs of death, or laid in the grave, it strikes us with some fear and concern, to think that one day this will be our own case; but no sooner is the dead interred, and the grave filled up again than all these serious thoughts begin to vanish, and men return to their sins and pleasures as before. And what folly is this! Should not men always keep alive the serious of death and a future state? Are we not always alike mortal? Are we not liable to death’s arrest at other times, as when examples are before our eyes?
–John Willison, The Afflicted Man’s companion.

This video about the late great Michael Jackson makes the point of the above quote very well.

It is good for the believer that he is afflicted; why? it springs from divine love, and it works for his soul’s good. Affliction is a seal of his adoption, and no sign of reprobation. The purest gold is the most tried, the sweetest grape is hardest pressed, and the truest Christian is heaviest crossed. But O how soon will the Christian forget all his groans when he comes to haven. As soon as Stephen saw Christ, though at a distance, he forgot all his wounds and bruises: he minded no more the terror of the stones about his ears, but sweetly yielded his soul into his Redeemers’s hands.
I read of many in the gospel, that by sickness and diseases were driven unto Christ, who, if they had enjoyed health and prosperity, would have neglected, like many others, to come to him. O blessed is that cross that draweth a sinner to Christ, to lay open his own misery and implore Christ’s mercy. And blessed by that Christ who never refuseth the sinner that cometh to him, though driven by affliction and misery. To whom shall such a distressed creature as I go, but to HIm who is the only physician that can cure both my soul of sin and my body of sickness.
—John Willison, a Meditation from the Afflicted mans companion.

I am bed-bound at the moment, in intractible pain that even the strongest medications do little to help, my usual attack I get every few weeks.  And as I was reading this below, it spoke to my heart feeling much the same snetiments and desires within.  The case below, the man was dying and was in terrible bodily pains.

I have read of another minister peaceful under the like extreme pains. When he was asked how he did, his frequent answr was: “The bush is always burning, but not consumed; though my pains are above the strength of nature, yet they are not above the supports of grace.” He would pray, “Lord, Lord, drop comfort into these bitter waters of Marah. Let the blood of sprinkling which extinguisheth the fire of thine anger, allay my burning pain. Oh, if my patience were greater, my pains would be less. Lord, Lord, give me patience, and inflict what thou wilt. This is a fiery chariot, but it will carry me to heaven. O my God, break open the prison door, and set my poor captive soul free. I desire to be dissolved, but enable me willingly to wait thy time.” He would again cry,  “When shall the time come when I shall neither  sin more, nor sorrow more? Lord, keep me from dishonouring thy Name by impatience. Oh, who would not, even in burnings, have honourable thoughts of God? Lord, thou givest me no occassion to have hard thoughts of Thee. Blessed be God, for the peace of mine inward man, when my outward man is so full of trouble. This is a bitter cup, but it is of my Father’s mixing; and shall I not then drink it?” [cited from John Willison’s The Afflicted Man’s companion A discourse for persons and families afflicted with sickness or any other distress.” the saint he is speaking of is unnamed.

This is something I feel burdened with my own past life at times, and still on-going through different seasons in the present.  The Bible tells us all to redeem the time well, yet, if you’re like me, you probably could improve on how well you redeem the time, and  I believe its something we should all be aiming to do.

God hath left many also tossing and groaning on beds of pain, when he hath raised you up. O then return like the thankful leper, and magnify God in your health. Hath God distinguished you from others by his goodness? It becomes you to distinguish yourselves from others by your thankfulness. O that men would praise the Lord for his goodness–underserved and distinguishing goodness.

To move you to this, let me set the example of Hezekiah before you. See how thankfully and affectionately he remembered the Lord’s merices in recovering and delivering him from the bitter affliction he had been under: “I said  I am deprived of the residue of my years; I shall behold man no more with the inhabitants of the world. Like a crane or a swallow so I did chatter; I did mourn as a dove. Behold, for peace I had great bitterness; but thou hast in love delivered it from the pit of corruption. The living shall praise thee, as I do this day.” Yea, he was so overcome with a sense of the Lord’s patience and mercy towards him, that he is at a loss how to express it. “What shall I say? He hath both spoken unto me, and himself hath done it.” Isa. 38:9-20

If you would rightly improve the sparing mercy and goodness of God, let it lead you to repentance and reformation of life. Turn from all these sins, whether of ommission or commission, now in the day of health, which conscience challenged you for in the time of sickness. Mind Christ’s caution and warning to healed sinners: “Behold, thou art made whole; sin no more, lest a worse thing come unto thee.” John 5:14. Oh let thy sin die with they sickness, and do not relapse into thy former security and sinful ways. BEware of returning with the dog to thy vomit, and like the sow that is washed, to the wallowing again in the mire of thy former sins and uncleannesses, lest being entangled and overcome again with the filthiness which thou now hast escaped, thy latter end prove worse than thy beginning.

And to sum up all I shall say in this chapter, be careful to redeem the time, and activing in providing for an eternal state. O prize and value the mercy of health and strength more than ever. Sympathize with those who are still lying on their sick beds, and under languishing distempers; neglect not to pity and pray for them. Remember the distressed case you were in yourself when you had no rest in your bones, when wearisome nights were appointed to you, and you were full of tossings to the dawning of the day. Consider how slippery is your standing. Though the late storm of trouble be over, yet the clouds will return after rain.
—John Willison, “The Afflicted man’s companion: A Directory for persons and families afflicted with sickness or any other distress.”

Blessedness is a riddle which can only be found out by faith, “which is the evidence of things not seen,” (Heb. xi. 1) That a poor, godly man is counted the filth and off-scouring of all things should be the only happy man; and that the great men of this world who have all things at will never enter into the heart of a natural man, that he hath only the light of sense and carnal reason to judge of things, for to sight and reason, it is nothing so. Wait for the light and power of  the Spirit, to incline and draw thy heart to God.  Many times we are doctrinally right in point of blessedness, but not practically; we content ourselves with the mere notion, but are not brought under the power of these truths; that is the work of the Spirit. It is easy to prove that it is the beasts happiness to enjoy pleasure without remorse; easy to prove the uncertainty of riches, and what unstable foundations they are for the work of the Holy Ghost. “This their way is their folly, yet their posterity approve their sayings” (Psalm xlix. 13). Many a man who stands over the grave of his ancestors, will say, Ah! how foolish they were to waste their time and strength in pleasure, and in hunting after worldly greatness, and esteem and favour with men; what doth is profit them now? And yet their posterity approve the same; that is, they live by the same principles, are as greedy upon worldy satsifactions as ever those were that have gone before that neglected God and heavenly things, and went down to the grave and their honour was laid in the dust. Until the Lord take off our heart by the light and power of his grace, we remain as sottish and foolish and wordly as they. [Thomas Manton--sermons on Psalm 119 volume 1]

The poor and off-scouring of all things, often become despised even among God’s people,  because they have been tried and tested in ways, that those who esteem them less because of natural infirmity in poverty, while those who like the above, find it easy to talk about blessedness, yet never seem to put that to practice to any extent, and  demonstrate they do actually depend on worldly comforts before that of the God that  they claim is theres, remain well thought of, because they are not tested the same, and talk is cheap, and words and actions are two entirely different things.  I have seen this demonstrated, by both affliction and riches, far away from my own situtation and circumstances,  yet the off-scouring of the world, who became impoverished,  and lost respect through natural infirmity, proved by their actions, the far sounder Christian, and the one who was really following God and seeking to do his will above others.  It seems to me often, that people will remain well thought of, simply because they have an easy time of it and are not pressed the same way as others,  but its often a case of talk is easy, and if even in comfort we show ourselves earthly minded,  and do not do the will of God in many respects, then we have little right to think ourselves better than those who have become impoverished, as the off scouring of all things.

Give me the off-scouring as my friend any time, above those who even in comfort fall far short of doing God’s will, yet remain well respected because they are not pressed the same,  as that off-scouring generally, will be the man or woman who follows God no matter where He leads them and proves their faith as practial and experimental, and not merely notional.  Theology and doctrine maketh no man or woman.  Comfort allows us to talk a good talk. But give me the off-scouring please, because they are the ones who are approved, and show themselves to be far more than notional or theoretical religion in faith and practice.

Of course, fellowship and friendship will always be a good thing, whether with the impoverished and off-scouring of all things, or those on easier times, as long as they are men and women who hold to experimental religion and not alot of notional, as in Manton’s quote.  But the same applies to any scenario, rich or poor, if we hold more to notional religion than experimental, we may gain the applause of men,  our learning  may profit them more in this life, than it will us in the next.  As we have not really proved anything as far as practice when that is the case,  and only God can really know if we be approved when that is the case.  The off-scouring however, stands approved as much as anyone can be.

I didn’t manage to get back to continuing loving one’s neighbour as ourself yesterday, though this post is not entirely unrelated,  if the Lord gives me time, strength and assitance to be able to, I hope to pick it back up over the next day or two.

When I get in a dark place in my illness and total isolation in it, sometimes, suicide/euthanasia can seem a big temptation. After all, folks with incurable illnesses, make that choice when they have loved ones to care for and about them, and who they will leave behind. And I am not so blessed, just myself and my cat, yet I am as ill and in some cases iller than many of those from my country that travels to Switzerland, having lost all hope. And yet when that choice is made in conditions such as Chronic fatigue syndrome, no matter the severity of the duration of it, that is not considered an incurable illness, yet, they lost all hope and took themselves to Switzerland. Yes, it’s controversial. Yes, its against the law of God. And yet, I am as human and infirm as anyone else, probably more so than most, and have needs and desires that anyone in a similar boat can most often take for granted, and I sit alone with just me and my cat. The verse that held me, stayed my hand when the last dark time hit, was Lo, I am with you always. But, each time the darkness descends you do have to make a choice.

Long term readers will know, I have often posted short quotes from TV programmes I have watched that are meaningful, and have felt personal or as if they speak for me. This is one such quote from last Saturday’s BBC 1 episode of casualty.

I don’t believe in fate, any more than I believe you can choose the moment you die, but in a strange way, I believe I am in a position of priviledge—I’ve come face to face with my own mortality—I’ve been reminded how precious and how fragile our lives really are. I’ve had to make a choice, and I choose hope.

This is a subject that has been weighing on me heavily for months. I have a somewhat unique view into some things because of the extent of my sufferings, that come under the heading of what Calvin termed “Extraordinary,” being outside most normal human experiences. I don’t plan to repeat any of them here, if you are not familar with this blog then I may suggest you read my “About” page.

I am going to be quoting extensively from John Beadle’s diary of a thankful Christian in this post and I am not sure  if I will be able to finish it in one single blog post or if there will need to be a part two out of neccessity out of consideration for readers time. I am posting it with the hopes of getting it out of my system instead of it continuing to burden me, and in the hope of doing some good, to any one else who any reader may know either now or in future who is in need of loving ones neighbour as yourself if they are in severe afflictions.

The response to this degree of suffering has also been extraordinary for the most part, from the Church, who as a church we should propogate love and  nurture each others spiritual well being, and the exact opposite for the most part was done. But this has however been weighing more heavily on me than ever before, through knowing others in dire affliction, outside the normal severity, and seeing the same thing propagated towards them, by folks who criticised those who had acted thus towards myself.  For me this is the thing that has led to me feel weighed down, both on behalf of the church, and God’s glory,  and if folks who we love are harmed needlessly it should bother us greatly.  If we love our neighbour as ourself at least.

In my opinion, it boils down to this: How much do we love our neighbour; do we love them as we love ourself?  And how thankful are we to God for the good things and blessings and comparative ease we find ourselves in?  The one, it is my belief has a direct bearing on the other.

The obvious example of Scripture is the book of Job. Whatever one thinks about the right royal shipwreck his friends made of trying to help him, their attempts were noble, and they sacrificed to do so.  We have every reason to suppose they too were prosperous men, being friends of Job, and also because of their speeches as regards prosperity as it related to being God’s children. The Bible itself tells us they were also righteous men.  They got it wrong, because even the most noble men of God, are not free of error or infallible,  but the point is, their intent and desire above anything else was to help Job.  They left their own prosperous lives behind, (which we can assume I think also included family, we have no reason to assume they were any different than most men of that age in that regards) they left it all though, to go to be with, and uphold and support their friend who was in such dire need and trouble. They loved their neighbour as themself, even in their mistaken belief that Job was not a righteous man, or it would not have all befallen him as it did. They sat in an ash heap with Job and never said a word for an entire week, they showed their love to him by that act alone; their regard for his well being and showing solidarity with him standing shoulder to shoulder with him in it, holding him up by their silent support. Who knows in those days also, how long the journey they had undertaken to be with him took aside from the time they were actually with him. Sometimes to those in severe affliction,  companionable silence can be more meaningful than words that will do harm rather than help.  They sacrficed their own pleasures, and things they could enjoy at home, being in the bosom of their families, in other words they denied themselves to the uttermost, to go and uphold and support Job in his trial.

What often seems to be forgotten in our days of ease and comfort today, is that by serving each other, we are also serving Christ. Christ said there is no greater love than a man who will lay down his life for his friends, [John 15:13] and in  way that is what Job’s friends did, because they cast their own lives, their own interests aside, in favour of  trying to help their friend.  If God gives us many blessings, then the more thankful we have to be, and the more willingly we should be to part or deprive ourself of them for a time to do the service of the Lord towards our brethren.  Children are blessings;  they should make one so full up with thanks to God, that we are brimming over with it, and that be displayed in our actions in our sevice to the Lord. With many children comes many responsibilites, but our first priority should always be to the service of the Lord, and HIS church. When we serve each other in the church, then we do indeed serve God. We shouldn’t set limits or boundaries on how much we are going to give Mr X or Mrs Y, or we are putting boundaries on how much we are willing to give  back to God, in grateful return for all he has given us, and the one debt of his precious Son’s blood that can never be repaid. If we are thankful, it will show, and this is one of the major ways, because it is the sum and substance of the Law of God.  To serve God and put God before any other creature, (that includes our nearest and dearest) and to fulfil the law by loving one’s neighbour as we do ourself.

Joseph Caryl in his exposition on Job, had much to say about the special blessings that children are. They are the greatst blessing God can give any man.  He can be read here and here on this subject.  The more our quiver is full of arrows, the greater the blessing from  God which despite the responsibility both financially and for their care, the gratitude we should have towards God for giving us them, remembering that they are not our own, and we deserve nothing good, each of us is deserving of hell, should make us put our service to God, before our enjoyment of our children or other blessings God has bestowed upon us.  If we do not, we have unthankful hearts, and are making idols of our children by putting them before our first service which should always be to God.

From John Beadle pp.124

When you have an opportunity of doing good, never plead you have many children. Cyprian had wont to say, The more children, the more charity.

Charity comes out of a thankful heart. That God has given us any good thing in this life, when we are nothing but poor worms crawling about in dungheaps. If God has given us many blessings, we should remember those blessings belong to him, are on loan to us, and he can take them back at any time, and he may do that, if we put them as the idols over our service to God, and that often comes in the form of our service to each other, and the church, and even to the stranger. Virgina is for Hugueont’s had an interesting post on Who is my Neighbour.
But when it comes to those we call our friends, have enjoyed sweet fellowship together and share the same religion with them, the desire to do good to them, should be even greater, the desire to deny our own pleasures in favour of taking up the service of God, and to love our neighbour as ourself, which if we do any less, we do not do, and break the whole law by not doing, should be borne our of love to both God and man, that the Lord is our first Love, and his service our first objective in all of life, and to love our neighbour as ourself, which if we do so, we will take their afflictions to heart as much as if they were our own, and help them bear it, weep with those who weep, and actively seek to relieve them, with no boundaries on time or thinking about the cost of what we may have to deny ourselves by doing so, becuase the things we deny ourselves for a short time of, do not belong to us anyway, they belong to the Lord, and he has only loaned them us, and he loans us things of a temporal nature, whether that be worldly riches or intimiate family relations, on the understanding that the Christians, always puts him and our service to him, and therefore show our love to him, and to show our thankfulness for him above anything or anyone else, FIRST. God is a jealous God. He will not share that glory with another. And he will not be robbed of it, by us putting anything of the world before Him. If we do anything less, then we show we love ourself far more than we do our neighbour and we value our own comforts before our service to God, as if we somehow deserve or merit them. And we also love ourself above our love to God. If we are also not thus self-sacrificing for our friends, as Job’s friends were in his trial, then it feels a betrayal to the person you call your friend while showing contempt to them by trying to assist them so little, and in some cases Psalm 55 may come to mind, especially if rather than helping, we actively make them worse.

I will leave this here for today for the readers’ convenience, but part two, will follow (DV) tomorrow.

I was hoping to get to something else, other than this, but time and life has beaten me today, tomorrow, I have a hospital appt with a pain specialist and not sure how worn out that will leave me, but one never knows, depending on how or what time I sleep, but I hope to come back to this other subject soon, if not sooner. This blog writer is up against the wall in almost every way, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, and to have to deal alone with extreme illness and the temptations and devils assualts that come from that, can be more than enough to handle at times in such solitude, as I am as infirm as anyone else, but without the aids, supports and encouragments of others in my acquaintance. So sometimes my blog is quiet, because I am dealing with what can at times feel like hell on earth, until I find some part of Scripture that will help lift me out of it. By faith alone, was the battle-cry of the reformation, yet I have not yet been in anyone elses acquainatnace when in severe affliction, that has faith alone to get them through it, without the comfort and assistance of mortals too. So my blog dies occassionally until I find the promise that will give me the strength to go on, by God’s grace, until the storm clouds gather the next time.

But this was a quote I felt worth sharing.

Remember this advice one gave to his friend; it may do you good that have much to do with men.
1. Have communion with few.
2. Be intimate with one.
3. Deal justly with all.
4. Speak evil of none.

It is somewhat singular, but I am sure very safe, to have one as our intimate and bosom friend. Alexander had his Ephestion, and David in the wilderness a Jonathan, and in the Court his Hushai, called the Kings friend. Yea, even Christ himself had John, if I may not say his Favourite, yet certainly the Disciple whom Jesus loved above the rest. And he is a wise man that will not put all into his Creed, that puts up in his Paternoster; nor will shew every man his mind or his money, he may converse with. Give unto Ceasar the things that are Ceasar’s; unto God the things that are Gods. Give faithfulness to men, but trust in God. And I am sure, to speak evil of none, unless we have a calling; to deal justly with all, with whom we have any dealing, will bring us much comfort living, great peace dying, and a good report when we are gone hence, and shall be seen no more.
–John Beadle from his Diary of a Thankful Christian. pp.117