A treatise on comforting afflicted consciences - The Digital Puritan

AFFLICTED CONSCIENCES. 367fountain, which afterwards is shed down upon us againmore amiably and acceptably when the darkness is done.And let us further take notice, that Christ, our eldest brother,blessed for ever, deals with us in such cases as Joseph(a type of him in many respects) dealt with his brethren.He frowned upon them, handled them roughly, and frightedthem extremely, only to humble tliem thoroughly ; but inthe mean time and midst of his menacing carriage, his heartwas so full of natural affection, that he was enforced bythe excess thereof to turn aside and weep, and so return tothern again. " And he turned himself about from them andwept, and returned to them again " (Gen. xlii, 24). So theSon of God, as well as God the Father through him, thoughsometimes " in a little wrath he hide his face from us ;"yet as he will certainly after " a small moment gather uswith great mercies "; so in the mean time " he is afflicted,"and most tenderly affected towards us *' in all our afflictions."See Isa. Ixiii, 9.CHAP. XVIII.The last help for the Curing of the former Malady.7. Think it not strange that thou art fallen into this kindof spiritual affliction, as though some strange thing, or thatwhich doth not or may not befal the dearest servants ofGod, had happened unto thee ; for herein thou becomestconformable to as holy men as ever the world had ; Job,David, Heman, Luther, 6cc. ; nay, to the Son of God himself,from whose example and precedency let the Christian,even in the darkest horror of a spiritual desertion, when heis afraid lest God hath forsaken him, fetch abundance ofcomfort and support out of such considerations as these —:(L) Christ himself was in the same case. Besides anumberless variety of most barbarous cruelties inflictedupon his blessed body by the merciless and implacablemalice of the Jews, and by consequent sympathy uponhis glorious soul ; he suffered also in soul immediately, intolerable,and (save by himself) unconquerable tormentsand pain. He grasped with the fiercest wrath of his Fatherfor our sins, and sweat blood under the sense of his angrycountenance. Nay, this cross upon his soul, infinitely moreweighty than that which he carried upon his shoulders towardsCalvary, did not only cause streams of great bloodydrops to fall down to the ground ; but also pressed fromhim that heavy jroaa, Mat. xxvi, 38, " My soul is exceed-