A treatise on comforting afflicted consciences - The Digital Puritan

;AFFLICTED CONSCIENCES. 3their hearts iu this life. What then so dreadful a face ofpresent confusions or fore-imagined forms of future troublesare able or ought slavislily to deject and terrify that holyheart, which with a sweet and safe repose is happily andeverlastingly hid under the wings of that mighty God(Ruth ii, 12; Psalm xci, 4), who for the deliverance ofhis can work,1. By weak means ; see Jud^. vii ; 1 Sam. xiv ; Gen. xiv ;1 Sam. xvii ; Judg. IV, 21, and ix, 53.2. Without means ; see 2 Chron. xx ; Exod. xiv ; Josh, vi2 Kings xix ; 2 Chron. xiv.3. Contrary to means; see Dan, vi, 22; Josh, iii, 16;Dan. iii, 25, 26; Jonah ii,6; Joih. x, 12, 13, 14.II. U hen the heavenly beams of God's pleased countenancebegin to break out upon a man through the dark andhellish mist of his manifold and heinous sins, the unquenchableheat of his everlasting love through Christ dissolvingthem into nothing, and fairly shine with a comfortable asspectupon his humbled soul, fpso facto, heaven and earth,and all the hosts of both, are everlastingly reconciled untohim and become his friends : the storms and tempests raisedby all the powers of hell are presently calmed for ever doinghim any deadly hurt. All the creatures then pull in theirhorns, withdraw iheir stings, bite in their poison, checkedand awed by those divine impressions of their Creator'sblessed image stamped upon them by the Spirit of graceand dare no more offer any violence or vexation to him (exceptupon particular dispensation for his spiritual good and.quickening) than to the apple ot God's own eye. Hear thepromise from God's own mouth: " And in that day will Imake a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, andwith the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things ofthe ground : and 1 will break the bow and the sword andthe battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie downsafely" (Hos. ii, 18). Nay, they are so far from chargingtheir several stings upon the saints, that they will changetheir very natures to do them service. They will rather becomean astonishment and horror to the whole creation thanthey be hurt. How often have they suspended and put offtheir native power and properties for the protection andgood of God's people 1 The very sea, that most raging androaring creature, must stay his course and current to givepassage and preservation to a true Israelite ; the stars mustfight and the sun stand still for the aid and advantage of God'sarmies; the lions must leave their savage rage and trade ofblood, and become lambs and loving unto a Daniel ; thelavens will feed an Elijah ; the flames of fire must hold iniheir heat from burning a Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-