Refuge in Trial

11 If any of you lack “wisdom, let hint
ask of God, that giveth to all
-men liberally, and -upbraideth
not; and it shall be given him.
But let him ask in faith, For he that ivavereth
is like a wave of the sea the wind and tossed.” — ST JAMES i. 5, 6.

ATT was a common thing for men In old times to provide themselves with a refuge against the hour when the worst came to the worst. You may see it in the crumbling ruins of our old castles, where, once carefully concealed behind the arras, it now stands exposed in the narrow stair within the thick and massive walls. By this, when the gates were forced, and the defenders, a bleeding band, were driven back from room to room, they, suddenly pushing aside a panel, descended into the dungeons; and issuing out by some secret port, escaped with their lives. And to this day the shepherds show the hiding-places among their green hills, the “holes and caves of the earth” to which our forefathers betook themselves when persecution waxed hot, and bloodhounds bayed at their heels. A midnight march brought the ruthless soldiery in the gray of the morning to the cottage of a lone upland, where some man of God was in hiding. They surrounded the house — but missed their prey. Warned by trusty watchers, who often concealed bold daring and deep cunning under the garb of homely simplicity, he was off. Near by rose a dizzy crag, roared a foaming waterfall; and ere his enemies arrived, the fugitive had leaped the chasm, and scaled the rock, and swinging himself up by the arms of a friendly mountain-ash, whose scarlet foliage screened the mouth of a dark cavern, he was safe within, singing to the music of the cataract these appropriate words: “In the time of trouble he shall hide me in his pavilion, in the secret of his tabernacle shall he hide me, he shall set me up upon a rock; and now shall mine head be lifted up above mine enemies round about me.”

The “Chronicles of Froissart” relate the strange issue of a siege which took place in the days of chivalry — and somewhere, I think, in France. Though gallantly defended, the out-works of the citadel had been carried; the breach was practicable; to-morrow was fixed for the assault. That none, alarmed at the desperate state of their fortunes, might escape under the cloud of night, the besiegers guarded every sally-port, and indeed the whole sweep of wall. They had the garrison in a net; and only waited for the morrow to secure, or to slaughter them. The night wore heavily on; no sortie wras attempted; no sound carne from the beleaguered citadel; its brave, but ill-starred defenders seemed to wait their doom in silence. The morning came; with its dawn the stormers rushed at the breach; sword in hand they poured in to find — the nest empty, cold. The bird was flown j the prey escaped. But how? That was a mystery; it seemed a miracle, till an opening was discovered that led by a flight of steps down into the bowels of the rock. They descended, and explored their way with cautious steps and lighted torches, until this subterranean passage led them out a long way off from the citadel, among quiet, green fields, and the light of day. It was plain that by this passage, the doors of which stood open, their prey had escaped under cover of the night. A clever device — a wise precaution. It was the refuge of the besieged, provided against such a crisis. And when affairs seem desperate, and the worst has come to the worst, how should it encourage God’s people to remember that He has promised them as safe a retreat! What says an apostle? “God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able to bear; but will with the temptation also make a way of escape.” Our extremity is His opportunity.

These words of Scripture, and a whole cloud of corresponding passages — “a cloud of witnesses,” indicate that God’s people always have a refuge in their days of trial. According to David, “God is known in hej- palaces for a refuge;” and in what glowing language is that truth sung out by Moses in his parting words to the tribes of Israel: “There is none like unto the God of Jeshurun, who rideth upon the heaven in thy help. The eternal God is thy refuge, and underneath are the everlasting arms. Happy art thou, O Israel! who is like unto thee, O people saved by the Lord, the shield of thy help, and who is the sword of thy excellency!”

Now let us turn our attention to one of the many refuges and sources of support which a pious man has amid the trials of life. “Is any among you afflicted? let him pray.” So says the apostle St James; and referring to the trials of the first Christians, he says: “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not; and it shall be given him. But let him ask in faith, nothing wavering. For he that wavereth is like a wave of the sea driven with the wind and tossed.” I would ask attention to the following points: — What we are to ask.

Wisdom! As used in Scripture, that word has a wide meaning; and here, as elsewhere, it may stand for all the graces and virtues that constitute true religion. And what of these we lack, whatever indeed we lack — not this or that man lacks, but any man, every man lacks, God promises a liberal supply of it. There is no restriction, no ex-

0* THE elusion here. He would have all men to pray. It is their own blame if people are not saved. As a mother would do to her fallen and guilty child, God opens His arms wide to the world; and would press it to His bosom. With the offer of Christ to all, and virtue in His blood to cleanse all, who is lost is his own murderer. Who goes to hell is not excluded, but excludes himself from heaven. As the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, whom He sent to seek and save the lost, God, if they will but ask it, giveth liberally to all men.

But though I do not understand the word wis« domy as employed by St James in the passage quoted, in a strictly literal sense, there is much need of wisdom, of a sound, right, practical judgment, in times of trial. That will save us much suffering, if not much sin.

It is not wise to fret under our trials; the high-mettled horse that is restive in the yoke but galls his shoulder — the poor bird that dashes herself against the bars of the cage but ruffles her feathers and aggravates the sufferings of captivity. It is not wise, overlooking the sovereign will of God, and that presiding Providence which numbers the hairs of our head as well as the stars of heaven, and without which neither a sparrow nor an angel can fall, to trace our calamities only to ourselves — that breeds but unavailing regrets; or to others — that only kindles bad and angry passions. It is not wise to look on our trials as heavier than those of others, and as warranting us to cry, in the language of Jerusalem, “Behold, and see if there be any sorrow like unto my sorrow, which is done unto me, wherewith the Lord hath afflicted me!” — that can only foster a rebellious spirit. It is not wise to forget that our blessings are loans from God; and that when we lose them, whether husband, wife, or child, health or wealth, fame or fortune, their owner but resumes His own, — otherwise we shall be ready to regard God as a robber, rather than to render Him the gratitude due to a most bountiful benefactor. It is not wise to cling too closely to the living, — else we shall some day be found embracing the dead. We are to inquire whether God has any controversy with us, whether He is not rebuking idolatry by destroying our idols, still it is not wise to regard our trials as being certainly expressions of His wrath: it were a great mistake to fancy that the goldsmith is dissatisfied with the gold he burns or the lapidary with the diamond he grinds, or the gardener with the tree he prunes. On the contrary, the metal is cast into the furnace, and the gem is ground on the wheel, and the tree bleeds beneath the knife, not because they are little, but because they are much esteemed. It is not wise to meet trials in our own strength; on the contrary, when they advance with threatening front let us run to God, and lay hold on Him; as, at the cry “Hold on,” sailors seize rope, mast, shrouds, or bulwark, when the curling wave rises at their bows, and, bursting, sweeps the deck; and but for their hold would sweep them overboard, into a watery grave. I need not say that it is not wise — it is madness, it is misery in this world, and damnation in the next, to fly from grief to the intoxicating bowl. I don’t say that it is unnatural. Tell the drowning man it is but a floating straw, a poor rotten twig he seizes, yet he clutches at it, grasps it; and when all God’s billows are going over men’s heads, those who have not comfort in God will seek it elsewhere, anywhere. Men have fled to the wine-cup to drown reflection; and I have heard a poor, wretched mother, the slave of drinking, trace her habits to domestic trials, to the desolation death had made in her home and heart. Miserable refuge! Job’s friends, indeed, are these stimulants — beer, wine, spirits: “Miserable comforters are ye all I” Yet, as the wise man says, “They drink to forget their poverty, and remember their misery no more.” By all means fly from sorrow to the bosom of God: but to fly from sorrow into the arms of sin is an awful illustration of the common adage, “An unsanctified affliction is the worst of all afflictions” — and also of the prophet’s question: “Why should ye be stricken any more? ye will revolt more and more.”

There is great need of wisdom under trials; to be enlightened as well as supported by the grace of God, and in the Holy Ghost to have a Counsellor as well as Comforter. With all thy getting get wisdom — wisdom to trace your trials to the Hand above; to bear them so that you may glorify God in the fires; to improve them, so that you may get the good intended, and be more than indemnified for their heaviest sufferings. The honey of the bee is an excellent antidote to its sting; and what comfort under trials like feeling that we are the better of them? Has not many a dark cloud, that in the distance lightened and thundered, and filled us with alarm, broke in blessings on our head — leaving us, as, passing away, it showed the bright bow of the covenant on its back, to say, “It is good for me that I was afflicted: before I was afflicted I went astray, but now have I kept thy word.” “Right are thy judgments, O Lord; in faithfulness thou hast afflicted me!” “Our light afflictions, which are but for a moment, shall work out for us a far more exceeding, even an eternal weight of glory,”

Next, Of whom we are to ask wisdom.

Of God, who giveth liberally and upbraideth not! If we want money, wre go to the bank; water, we go to the well; medicine, we go to the physician; and who wants divine blessings, mercy to pardon, or grace to help, is to go to God — “He giveth liberally.”

Did you ever stand in a bright summer day by the black swirling pool at the foot of a waterfall, and look up to the top of the cascade, where, scattering its liquid beads, like sparkling diamonds, it sprang boldly out from the rock into the air? How ceaseless the flow! and with its snowy foam ever flashing in the light of day, and its deep, solemn voice, in that lone glen, ever praising God through the hours of night — what an image does it offer of the stream of mercies that are continually falling on us from the bountiful hand of God!

The Scriptures employ other, and indeed many images of God’s affluent bounty. God himself says, “I will be as the dew unto Israel” — but there are cloudy skies and breezy nights when no dew falls, emblem of divine bounty, to hang gems on every bush, and sow the fields with “orient pearls.” Again it is said: “He shall come down like rain upon the mown grass, as showers that water the earth” — but there are days and weeks without a drop of rain. Again it is said, “I will pour water upon him that is thirsty, and floods upon the dry ground” — but it is only on rare occasions that the river, swollen by many a tributary, comes down red and roaring, and, overflowing all its banks, turns every wooded knoll into an island, and green valleys into inland seas. But, is there ever a month, a week, a day, an hour, a moment, a single moment, when from thy blessed and bountiful hand, O God! mercies are not falling in showers — thick as the rain-drops that shimmer in sunlight on the water, or as the snow-flakes that fill the wintry air!

He giveth liberally, and He giveth constantly; and, if He pours such affluence of blessings on all men, even on His enemies, even on those that trample the mercies, as they trample the snows, of heaven under their foul, guilty feet, what may not His own, His chosen people, expect? Will He deny His fathership when they, His children, His own loving children, repair to Him with wounds to stanch, with cheeks to dry, with bruised or broken hearts to bind, with cries like these — Father, help me, I am weak! Lift me up, I have fallen! Forgive me, I have sinned! Save, oh, save me, I perish! How have I seen a poor wandering vagrant, when her child, footsore and weary, had sunk, crying, on the road, true to a mother’s love, take up the creature in her arms, and, shifting its burden to her own back, trudge on her weary way? And what may not you, groaning undei your burdens, hope for from Him, who is as much greater than we in love, as in the wisdom that planned, and the power that built this glorious universe? You know what are your thoughts and ways to a darling child that is withering away like a delicate flower, over whose couch you hang in anxious solicitude, for whom you have prayed in agony, and whose young life you would purchase at the price of all your fortune! Hear, then, what God says: “My ways and my thoughts to you, are as far above your ways and thoughts to it, as the heavens are above the earth.” I have known a mother who trod the great city’s streets, with weary steps and broken heart, the long night through, searching every house and den of infamy to find her lost one. She found her. Clasping the unholy thing to her virtuous bosom, locking her in close embraces, to win the wanderer back, how did she promise her every pleasure of home, with these hands to toil and work for her, never to cast up her sins, nor speak an upbraiding word? and these yearnings of a mother’s heart, what were they, but, if I might say so, a spark struck from divinity — a drop out of the ocean of love that fills the bosom of an infinite God!

“He upbraideth not/1 You are unworthy; you have abused my kindness; chanty is wasted on you; I am tired of helping you; patience is exhausted; you come too often; you ask too much — such language never fell from the lips of God. I have often seen a shivering, ragged child, or a widow, in brown and rusty weeds, with an emaciated infant in her bosom, timidly knocking at a rich man’s door, to have it, as soon as it was opened and they were seen, shut rudely in their face. And while I thought how ill it would be for them were God, in their hour of need — on a bed of death, or at a bar of judgment — to deal with them as they deal with others, it was blessed to think that the door of mercy is shut in no man’s face; that God’s heart is shut against no man’s misery; that God’s hand is shut against no man’s need; that God’s eye is shut to no man’s danger; that God’s ear is shut to no man’s prayer. “He giveth liberally, and upbraideth not.” Appearing in human form, and speaking through the voice of

His beloved Son, He stands up there at the wide-open door of heaven, crying, “Come unto Me, all ye that labour, and are heavy laden;” be your burden sins or sorrows, be your load grief or guilt, Come unto me, and I will give you rest; Cast thy burden on the Lord and He will sustain it; Open thy mouth wide and He will fill it.

Again, How we are to ask.

With faith, nothing wavering!

The pendulum of a time-piece is in constant motion, yet it makes no progress, because it has no sooner swung a certain way to one side, than it swings as far to the other. In like manner, as you may know by watching the floating weed, or the foam-bells that whiten it, or the boat that rides on its back — the mass of water that forms a wave makes no progress. Impelled by the wind, the wave advances, but not the water of which it is formed. If the water did, it would bear yonder drowning wretch to the shore; nor merely leave the wave, passing under, to raise his head to catch a sight of the blessed land, and then, rolling away to break on the beach, leave him to perish. And so, alas! will it be with many, who are not altogather insensible to religious impressions, who may even be easily affected by such influences as a sermon, the solemnities of a death-bed, the heaving swell of a revival; and being so, imagine themselves on the way to heaven, just as many careless observers imagine because the wave goes shoreward, the water also does.

As employed by St James to describe certain characters, the wave is a most felicitous figure. Look at a boat floating on the sea, at high or low water, when the tide, out or in, and on the turn, has ceased to run; or watch a boat away amid the swell of a mountain lake when the wind, retiring to its caves among the hills, has roared itself to rest! It is in constant motion between earth and heaven — now mounting to the top of the billow, and now sinking out of sight in the trough of the sea; yet with all this violent action, heaving, tossing, rolling, the skiff does not make an inch of way, but continues to ride over the self-same spot. Too true a figure of many professing Christians! Vacillating — not hypocrites, but through the influence of opposing motives — double-minded, and therefore unstable, heaven now seems to draw them upward, and then again earth draws them down — now, following Christ, they cry, with the young ruler, “Master, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” and then, with their backs turned on Him, they are leaving Him; sorrowful, perhaps, but still leaving Him — now they are casting sin away from them, and by and by they are locked in her foul embraces — now they are fighting the Philistines, and ere long you find them sound asleep in Delilah’s lap — now full of alarm, in fear of hell, pricked to the heart, their conscience awake, bent on being saved, they make a rush for heaven, and their foot is on the door-step — “they are not far from the kingdom of heaven;” but a cross lies on the threshold, and stumbling on that they fall — fall back into sin; and the last state of that man is perhaps worse than the first. One day they seem to serve Christ, and certainly serve their lusts the next. They don’t want to lose heaven, yet they cannot part with earth. Often starting up in their sleep, like one disturbed by horrid dreams, they are ever falling back again into slumber; and thus, equally affected by opposite influences, they are like a wave of the sea, rising and falling, now moving heavenward, now earthward — driven with the wind and tossed. Well, of a life spent in such unsteady efforts after what is good — in sinning to-day, and repenting to-morrow — what is to be the issue? It comes to nothing; like a door moving on its hinges, they make no progress; and the fate of their hopes, when death throws them on another world, is foreshadowed by the wave, that, launched on an iron-bound shore, bursts into froth and foam* The end of these things is death.

Who, dying, would go to glory, who would be redeemed from sin and hell, who would secure a saving interest in Christ, who would have strength to endure trial, and stand its buffetings, as a rock stands the blows of waves, must have his heart steadily, resolutely, firmly fixed on divine things. “No man having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of heaven.” Pray for unwavering faith, a strong — as Jabez Bunting, when dying, said, an obstinate faith in God. Seek such faith as not only lays hold of Him, but holds Him and won’t let Him go; that has the grasp of a drowning man. Seek a faith greater than Joshua’s, when, laying its hand on the sun, he held it back from going on; a faith like Jacob’s, who, strange as it seems, held God from going away, as, endowed with superhuman energy, he wrestled the night through with an angel, and, the stronger of the two, prevailed — replying to the prayer, Let me go, for the day breaketh, I will not let thee go, unless thou bless me.

Were this too bold a freedom to take with God? No! We have “boldness to enter into the holiest by the blood of Jesus.” It is the boldness of the little child that, unabashed by any one’s presence, climbs his father’s knee, and throws his arms around his neck — or, bursting into his room, breaks in on his busiest hours, to have a bleeding finger bound, or some childish tears kissed away; that says if any threaten or hurt him, I will tell my father; and, however he might tremble to sleep alone, fears neither ghosts, nor man, nor darkness, nor devils, if he lies couched at his father’s side. Such confidence, bold as it seems, springs from trust in a father s love; and pleases rather than offends us. Well, then, if you that are evil have such hearts, and know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will our heavenly

Father give the Holy Spirit, all, everything they need, to them who ask — asking with faith, nothing wavering!

Hope, as well as prayer, opens a welcome refuge to the good man in times of trial. “Blessed is he that endureth temptation, for when he is tried he shall receive the crown of life which the Lord hath promised to them that love him.” Here, how true is the common proverb: “All is well that ends well.” It is not, Blessed is he that hath no trials, whose heart they never wrung; whose tears never flowed; whose brightest prospects were never clouded; whose dearest hopes never lay withered and scattered like autumn leaves, on life’s rough and rugged path; who never entered the fiery furnace, nor trod the swelling flood. He is blessed who endureth temptation; stands the test; bears his burden well; glorifies God in the fires, and comes forth shining like gold from a refiner’s furnace. Every wave of trouble lifts him but higher on the Rock of Ages — wafts him nearer to the heavenly shore.

Let the downcast lift their heads, and look upward and forward! For the joy set before Him,

Jesus endured the cross and despised the shame. And He says, Learn of me; overleap the narrow bounds of a few short years, and what shall your present sorrow be but the morning’s recollection of a disagreeable dream! The days of your mourning shall be ended — your cross exchanged for a shining crown. I have heard one say, as he bent over a friend who was groaning under the surgeon’s knife, It will soon be over! and so Jesus, with tender fellow-feeling for their infirmities, consoles His suffering people. Amid your trials, think of that — they will soon be over; sooner, perhaps, than you fancy. Your salvation, not only nearer than when you believed, may be nearer than you suppose; even now the cry may be sounding in heaven — Room for another saint! a crown for another head! and the next turn of the road may bring you in front of the gates of glory. Whatever be your cross, don’t keep, with downcast head, looking at it; but raise your eyes to the crown that hangs yonder in heaven — beyond the grave. When grim death comes, see it glittering bright behind his awful form; nor fear the King of Terrors. Constructed of bands of metal and bits of stone, and doomed to perish in the wreck of all things, other crowns grace the brows of dying men; they are borne in the procession that carries a king to his grave — and, in mockery of the royal pageant, the heads that wore them are laid, ’ low as a beggar’s, in the dusty tomb. But this is a crown of life. Immortals wear it, and it is itself immortal — “a crown of glory that fadeth not away.” And how will that moment swallow up all memory of the sorrows of earth, when, led by angels, or a father or mother, within the brilliant circle where you recognise the glorified forms of long-lost friends, you stand before the throne; and, bending low your head, receive, amid the plaudits of the sky, this crown at the hand of Jesus.

And what shall heaven see there and then? Life crowning love! not Merit, that stands proud and panting at the goal; not Success, that has filled the world with famous deeds; not Learning, that has explored all the mysteries of knowledge, human and divine; not Prophecy, with her many tongues; not even Faith, grasping the cross; nor clear-eyed Hope, with her hand on the anchor, and her gaze on heaven; but Love, the true queen of graces. She who, when Faith seemed to lose hold of Christ, and Hope to lose sight of heaven, still clung to Jesus; and, refusing to part with Him, said, Entreat me not to leave thee, nor to return from following after thee; where thou goest I will go, and where thou lodgest I will lodge. Thanks be to God who giveth us the victory, through our Lord Jesus Christ, says St Paul; and I say, thanks be to God, who bestows the crown of life on those that love Him; and can say, Though I have not honoured thee, nor served thee, nor followed thee, nor fought for thee, nor wrought for thee, nor suffered nor sacrificed for thee, as I should have done, yet, “Lord, thou that knowest all things, knowest that I love thee.”