The blessed effects of chastisement.

Posted : 30 Apr, 2013 02:11 AM

Psalm 119:68 You are good, and do good: teach me Your statutes.





The blessed effects of chastisement, as a special instance of

the Lord's goodness, might naturally lead to a general

acknowledgment of the goodness of His character and

dispensation. Judging in unbelieving haste, of His providential

and gracious dealings, feeble sense imagines a frown, when

the eye of faith discerns a smile, upon His face; and therefore

in proportion as faith is exercised in the review of the past, and the experience of the present, we shall be prepared with

the ascription of praise-You are good. This is indeed the

expression-the confidence-the pleading-of faith. It is the sweet

taste of experience-restraining the legality of the conscience,

the many hard and dishonorable thoughts of God, and

invigorating a lively enjoyment of Him. Indeed 'this is the true

and genuine character of God. He is good-He is goodness.

Good in Himself-good in His essence-good in the highest

degree. All the names of God are comprehended in this one

of Good. All the acts of God are nothing else but the effluxes

of His goodness distinguished by several names according to

the object it is exercised about. When He confers happiness

without merit, it is grace. When He bestows happiness against

merit, it is mercy. When He bears with provoking rebels, it is

patience. When He performs His promise, it is truth. When He

commiserates a distressed person, it is pity. When He

supplies an indigent person, it is bounty. When He supports

an innocent person, it is righteousness. And when He pardons

a penitent person, it is mercy. All summed up in this one

name-Goodness. None so communicatively good as God. As

the notion of God includes goodness, so the notion of

goodness includes diffusiveness. Without goodness He would

cease to be a Deity; and without diffusiveness He would

cease to be good. The being good is necessary to the being

God. For goodness is nothing else in the notion of it but a

strong inclination to do good, either to find or to make an

object, wherein to exercise itself, according to the propensity

of its own nature; and it is an inclination of communicating

itself, not for its own interest, but for the good of the object it

pitches upon. Thus God is good by nature; and His nature is

not without activity. He acts consistently with His own natureYou are good, and do good.' (Charnock)

How easily is such an acknowledgment excited towards an

earthly friend! Yet who has not daily cause to complain of the

coldness of his affections towards his God? It would be a sweet morning's reflection to recollect some of the

innumerable instances, in which the goodness of God has

been most distinctly marked, to trace them in their peculiar

application to our own need; and above all to mark, not only

the source from which they come, but the channel through

which they flow. A view of covenant love does indeed make

the goodness of God to shine with inexpressible brightness "in

the face of Jesus Christ;" and often when the heart is

conscious of backsliding, does the contemplation of this

goodness under the influence of the Spirit, prove the Divinely

appointed means of "leading us to repentance." Let us

therefore wait on, even when we see nothing. Soon we shall

see, where we did not look for it. Soon we shall find goodness

unmingled-joy unclouded, unspeakable, eternal.

Meanwhile, though the diversified manifestations-the

materials of our happiness, in all around us, be countless as

the particles of sand, and the drops of dew; yet without

heavenly teaching they only become occasions of our deeper

misery and condemnation. It is not enough that the Lord

gives-He must teach us His statutes. Divine truths can only be

apprehended by Divine teaching. The scholar, who has been

longest taught, realizes most his need of this teaching, and is

most earnest in seeking it. Indeed, "the earth is full of the

goodness of the Lord," yet we may be utterly ignorant of it.

The instances of goodness in the shape of a cross, we

consider to be the reflection on it. Nothing is goodness in our

eyes, that crosses our own inclination. We can hardly bear to

hear of the cross, much less to take it up. We talk of

goodness, but yield to discontent. We do not profess to dislike

trial-only the trial now pressing upon us-any other cross than

this; that is, my will and wisdom rather than God's. Is there

not, therefore, great need of this prayer for Divine teaching,

that we may discern the Lord's mercies so closely crowded

together, and make the due improvement of each? Twice

before had the Psalmist sent up this prayer and plea. Yet he seems to make the supplication ever new by the freshness

and vehemency of his desires. And let me ever make it new

by the remembrance of that one display of goodness, which

casts every other manifestation into the shade-"God so loved

the world, that He gave His only-begotten Son."

This constitutes of itself a complete mirror of infinite and

everlasting goodness-the only intelligent display of His

goodness-the only manifestation, that prevents from abusing

it. What can I say to this-but You are good, and do good?

What may I not then expect from You! '"Teach me Your

statutes." Teach me the Revelation of Yourself-Teach me the

knowledge of Your Son. For "this is life eternal, that I might

know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You

have sent."'



by

Charles Bridges

http://grace-ebooks.com

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