Choice selections from Thomas Brooks,
The Mute Christian Under the Smarting Rod
When He shows no anger!
"The Lord disciplines the one He loves, and
punishes every son whom He receives." Heb. 12:6
There cannot be a greater evidence of God's
hatred and wrath?than His refusing to correct
men for their sinful courses and vanities!
Where God refuses to correct?there God resolves
to destroy! There is no man so near God's axe?so
near the flames?so near hell?as he whom God
will not so much as spend a rod upon!
"Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline."
Revelation 3:19
God is most angry?when He shows no anger!
Who can seriously meditate upon this, and not
be silent under God's most smarting rod?
All the hell that you shall ever have!
Consider Christian, that all your . . .
trials and troubles,
calamities and miseries,
crosses and losses,
which you meet with in this world?is all
the hell that you shall ever have!
Here and now you have your hell.
Hereafter you shall have your heaven!
This is the worst of your condition;
the best is yet to come!
Lazarus had his hell first, his heaven last; but
Dives had his heaven first, and his hell at last.
You have all your pangs, and pains, and throes
here?that you shall ever have! Your ease, and
rest, and pleasure?is yet to come!
Here you have all your bitters;
your sweets are yet to come!
Here you have your sorrows;
your joys are yet to come!
Here you have all your winter nights;
your summer days are yet to come!
Here you have your evil things;
your good things are yet to come!
Death will put an end to all your sins?
and to all your sufferings!
Death will be an inlet to those joys, delights,
and comforts?which shall never have an end!
Who can seriously meditate upon this, and not
be silent under God's most smarting rod?
Then the scum appears!
Few Christians see themselves and understand
themselves rightfully. By trials, God reveals
much of a man's sinful self to his pious self.
When the fire is put under the pot?then the
scum appears; so when God tries a poor soul,
Oh! how does . . .
the scum of pride,
the scum of murmuring,
the scum of distrust,
the scum of impatience,
the scum of worldliness,
the scum of carnality,
the scum of foolishness,
the scum of willfulness?
reveal itself in the heart of the poor creature?
Trials are God's looking-glass, in which
His people see their own faults. Oh! . . .
that looseness,
that vileness,
that wretchedness,
that sink of filthiness,
that gulf of wickedness,
which trials show to be in their hearts!
"I have tested you in the furnace of affliction."
Isaiah 48:10
When Munster lay sick
"Those whom I love I rebuke and discipline."
Revelation 3:19
"The Lord disciplines the one He loves, and
punishes every son whom He receives." Heb. 12:6
All the afflictions which come upon the saints,
are the fruits of divine love.
When Munster lay sick, and his friends asked
him how he did, and how he felt; he pointed to
his sores and ulcers, whereof he was full, and said,
"These are God's gems and jewels with which He
decks his best friends, and to me they are more
precious than all the gold and silver in the world!"
"It was good for me to be afflicted!" Psalm 119:71
God afflicts you, O Christian, in love! Therefore Luther
cries out, 'Strike, Lord, strike, Lord! and spare not!'
Father knows best!
"Our fathers disciplined us for a little while as they
thought best; but God disciplines us for our good,
that we may share in His holiness." Hebrews 12:10.
What God, our Father wills, is best.
When He wills sickness, sickness is better than health.
When He wills weakness, weakness is better than strength.
When He wills poverty, poverty is better than wealth.
When He wills reproach, reproach is better than honor.
When He wills death, death is better than life.
As God is wisdom itself, and so knows that which is
best; so He is goodness itself, and therefore cannot
do anything but that which is best?therefore remain
silent before the Lord.
Everything on this side hell is mercy
Oh! labor every day to be more humble and more
low and little in your own eyes. 'Who am I,' says
the humble soul?'but that God should cross me in
this mercy, and take away that mercy, and pass a
sentence of death upon every mercy? I am not
worthy of the least mercy, I deserve not a
crumb of mercy, I have forfeited every mercy.'
Only by pride comes contention. It is only pride that
puts men upon contending with God and men.
A humble soul will lie quiet at the foot of God, it
will be contented with bare necessities. A dinner
of green herbs relishes well with the humble man's
palate; whereas a stalled ox is but a coarse dish to
a proud man's stomach.
A humble heart thinks none less than himself, nor
none worse than himself.
A humble heart looks upon small mercies as great
mercies; and great afflictions as small afflictions;
and small afflictions as no afflictions; and therefore
sits mute and quiet under all. Do but keep humble,
and you will keep silent before the Lord.
Pride kicks, and flings, and frets; but a humble man
has still his hand upon his mouth. Everything on
this side hell is mercy?much mercy, rich mercy
to a humble soul; and therefore he remains mute
under the smarting rod.
It is not your strongest resolutions or purposes, without
the grace of the Spirit, which can overmaster a lust. A
soul-sore will continue to run?though we resolve and
say it shall not. It was the blood of the sacrifice, and
the oil, which cleansed the leper in the law. And by
them is meant the blood of Christ and the grace of
His Spirit. Lev. 14:14-16. It was a touch of Christ's
garment which cured the woman of her bloody issue.
Your strongest resolutions or purposes may hide a sin,
but cannot quench it. They may cover a sin, but cannot
cut off a sin. A black patch may cover a sore?but it
does not cure it! Neither is it the papists' purgatories,
watchings, whippings, nor the kissing of the statue
of St. Francis, or licking of lepers' sores?which will
cleanse the fretting leprosy of sin!
In the strength of Christ, and in the power of the Spirit
?set soundly upon the mortifying of every lust! Oh, hug
none, indulge none?but resolvedly set upon the ruin of
every lust!
One leak in a ship will sink it!
One stab strikes Goliad just as dead?as twenty-three did Caesar!
One Delilah may do Samson as much mischief as all the Philistines!
One broken wheel spoils the whole clock!
One vein bleeding will let out all the vitals!
One fly will spoil a whole box of ointment!
One bitter herb will spoil all the pottage!
By eating one apple, Adam lost paradise!
One lick of honey endangered Jonathan's life!
One Achan was a trouble to all Israel!
One Jonah raises a storm and becomes load too
heavy for the whole ship! Just so?one unmortified
lust will raise very strong storms and tempests in the
soul! And therefore, as you would have a blessed calm
and quietness in your own spirits under your sharpest
trials, set thoroughly upon the work of mortification.
Gideon had seventy sons, and but one bastard child,
yet that bastard child destroyed all his seventy sons!
Ah, Christian! do you not know what a world of mischief
one unmortified lust may do? And therefore let nothing
satisfy you but the blood of all your lusts!
You have been long a-gathering rust
Oh! but my afflictions are greater than other
men's afflictions are! Oh! there is no affliction
like my affliction! How can I not murmur?
It may be your sins are greater than other men's
sins. If you have sinned against . . .
more light,
more love,
more mercies,
more promises,
than others?no wonder if your afflictions are
greater than others! If this be your case, you
have more cause to be mute than to murmur!
It may be that the Lord sees that it is very needful
that your afflictions should be greater than others.
It may be your heart is harder than other men's
hearts, and prouder and stouter than other men's
hearts, it may be your heart is more impure than
others, and more carnal than others, or else more
selfish and more worldly than others, or else more
deceitful and more hypocritical than others, or
else more cold and careless than others, or more
formal and lukewarm than others.
Now, if this is your case, certainly God sees
it very necessary, for . . .
the breaking of your hard heart, and
the humbling of your proud heart, and
the cleansing of your foul heart, and
the spiritualizing of your carnal heart, etc.,
that your afflictions should be greater than
others; and therefore do not murmur!
Where the disease is strong, the remedy must
be strong?else the cure will never be wrought!
God is a wise physician, and He would never
give strong medicine?if a weaker one could
effect the cure!
The more rusty the NAIL is, the oftener we put it
into the fire to purify it; and the more crooked it
is, the more blows and the harder blows we give
to straighten it.
You have been long a-gathering rust; and
therefore, if God deal thus with you, you have
no cause to complain.
"For the Lord disciplines the one He loves, and
punishes every son whom He receives." Heb. 12:6
If you attempt to enthrone the creature!
O Christian! God has removed one of your sweetest mercies,
comforts, or enjoyments! It may be you have over-loved them,
and over-prized them, and over-much delighted yourself in
them. It may be they have often had your heart?when they
should have had but your hand. It may be that care, that
concern, that confidence, that joy?which should have been
expended upon more noble objects?has been expended
upon them!
Your heart is Christ's bed of spices?and it may be
you have bedded your mercies with you?when Christ
has been made to lie outside! You have had room for
them?when you have had none for Him! They have
had the best?when the worst have been counted good
enough for Christ!
It is said of Reuben, that he went up to his father's bed,
Gen. 49:4. Ah! how often has one creature comfort, and
sometimes another?been put in between Christ and
your souls! How often have your dear enjoyments gone
up to Christ's bed! Your near and dear mercies have
come into Christ's bed of love?your hearts!
Now, if you take a husband, a child, a friend?into that
room in your soul which only belongs to God?He will
either embitter it, remove it, or be the death of it.
If once the love of a wife runs out more to a servant, than
to her husband?the husband will remove that servant;
though otherwise he was a servant worth gold.
Now, if God has stripped you of that very mercy with which
you have often committed spiritual adultery and idolatry?
have you any cause to murmur?
There are those who love their mercies into their graves?
who hug their mercies to death?who kiss them until they
kill them! Many a man has slain his mercies?by setting too
great a value upon them! Many a man has sunk his ship of
mercy?by overloading it. Over-loved mercies are seldom
long-lived. The way to lose your mercies is to indulge them!
The way to destroy them is to fix your minds and hearts
upon them. You may write bitterness and death upon that
mercy first?which has first taken away your heart from God.
Christian! Your heart is Christ's royal throne, and in this
throne Christ will be chief! He will endure no competitor!
If you attempt to enthrone the creature?be it ever
so near and dear unto you?Christ will dethrone it! He
will destroy it! He will quickly lay them in a bed of dust
?who shall aspire to His royal throne!
"This is what the Sovereign Lord says: I am about to desecrate
my sanctuary?the stronghold in which you take pride, the delight
of your eyes, the object of your affection. The sons and
daughters you left behind will fall by the sword!" Ezekiel 24:21
You are the one who has done this!
"I was silent; I would not open my mouth, for You
are the one who has done this!" Psalm 39:9
In the words you may observe three things:
1. The person speaking, and that is, David. David
a king, David a saint, David 'a man after God's own
heart,' David a Christian. And here we are to look
upon David, not as a king, but as a Christian, as a
man whose heart was right with God.
2. The action and carriage of David under the hand
of God, in these words?'I was silent; I would not
open my mouth.'
3. The reason of this humble and sweet carriage
of his, in these words?'for You are the one who
has done this!'
The proposition is this: That it is the great duty and
concern of gracious souls to be mute and silent under
the greatest afflictions, the saddest providences, and
sharpest trials that they meet with in this world.
David's silence is an acknowledgment of God as the
author of all the afflictions that come upon us. There
is no sickness so little, but God has a finger in it;
though it be but the aching of the little finger.
David looks through all secondary causes to the first
cause, and is silent. He sees a hand of God in all, and
so sits mute and quiet. The sight of God in an affliction
is of an irresistible efficacy to silence the heart, and to
stop the mouth of a godly man.
Men who don't see God in an affliction, are easily
cast into a feverish fit, they will quickly be in a flame;
and when their passions are up, and their hearts on
fire, they will begin to be saucy, and make no bones of
telling God to His teeth, that they do well to be angry.
Those who will not acknowledge God to be the author of
all their afflictions, will be ready enough to fall in with
that mad principle of the Manichees, who maintained
the devil to be the author of all calamities; as if there
could be any evil or affliction in the city, and the Lord
have no hand in it, Amos 3:6.
If God's hand be not seen in the affliction, the heart
will do nothing but fret and rage under affliction.
Those who can see the ordering hand of God in all their
afflictions, will, with David, lay their hands upon their
mouths, when the rod of God is upon their backs!
They see that it was a Father who put those bitter cups
in their hands; and love that laid those heavy crosses
upon their shoulders; and grace that put those yokes
around their necks?and this caused much quietness
and calmness in their spirits.
When God's people are under the rod, He makes by His
Spirit and word, such sweet music in their souls, as allays
all tumultuous motions, passions, and perturbations.
"I was silent; I would not open my mouth, for You
are the one who has done this!" Psalm 39:9
