The Spurgeon Fellowship Journal - Historical Reflection


	Historical Reflection Chastisement by Charles Haddon Spurgeon (Continued from page 1) The first evil to which the chastened Christian is liable is this: he may despise the hand of God. The second is, that he may faint when he is rebuked. We will begin with the first: "My son despise not thou the chastening of the Lord." I. This may be done in five ways, and in discussing the subject, I shall propose the remedy for each of these as we pass along. First, a man may despise the chastening of the Lord when he murmurs at it. Ephraim is like a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke; when a son of God first feels the rod, he is like a bullock—he kicks at it, he cannot bear it. He is an unbroken colt, and when he first feels the collar put upon his shoulders, he rears in the air, and by all manner of ways expresses his aversion thereunto. The first time a child of God receives a blow from his Father's hand he may possibly turn round upon his own tender Father and murmur at him: "Why ought I to have this? Why am I thus punished and afflicted? Why should I be chastised? What have I done to be afflicted and chastened? "You will wonder, perhaps, that a man who has grace in his heart should talk like this; but in reality we do say so—not with the words of our lips, but with the thoughts of our hearts, for we sit down and say, "I am the man who hath seen affliction—I am the man more tried and troubled than others. No one is ever chastened as I am." And we look around with the eye of jealousy exclaiming, "That man is happier than I—that man has less sorrow and suffering." We are too apt to put our own condition in the worst place, and describe ourselves as being the most afflicted of all God's people. Though we blush to say it, it is true. There are murmurers in the midst of Israel now, as well as in the camp of Israel of old; there are people of God who, when the rod falls, cry out against it, who, instead of kissing the Son lest he be angry, turn round upon him, and speak against the afflictive dispensations of God. We know ourselves what it is when we have a little sickness to be so cross, that hardly anybody dares to speak to us, and if we have a little pain, perhaps in our head, we know what it is to think all the world is going wrong, and to be grieved, and vexed, and melancholy on that account. Many of you have been foolish enough when bereaved of your property, to cry out, "Ah! God takes everything away. He smites me with one stroke upon another. Surely he is an unkind God." And you have felt when you have lost your friends that you could not say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord." You have thought, "Oh! wherefore this? Simon is not, and Joseph is not, and now ye would take Benjamin away. All these things are against me "We have murmured, now listen to the exhortation: "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord." That is despising God's chastening, when we murmur at it. Patience is the only way to receive it. A want of resignation shows we despise God's chastening hand. A word with thee, O murmurer! Why shouldst thou murmur against the dispensations of thy heavenly Father? Can he treat thee more hardly than thou deservest? Consider what a rebel thou wast once, but he has pardoned thee. Surely if he chooses now to lay the rod upon thee, thou needest not cry out. Hast thou not read, that amongst the Roman emperors of old it was the custom when they would set a slave at liberty, to give him a blow upon the head, and then say, "Go free?" This blow which thy Father gives thee is a token of thy liberty, and dost thou grumble because he smites thee rather hardly? After all, are not his strokes fewer than thy crimes, and lighter than thy guilt? Art thou smitten as hardly as thy sins deserve? Consider the corruption that is in thy breast, and then wilt thou wonder that there needs so much of the rod to fetch it out? Weigh thyself, and discern how much dross is mingled with thy gold, and dost thou think the fire too hot to get away so much dross as thou hast? Why, thou hast not the furnace hot enough, methinks. There is too much dross, too little fire; the rod is not laid on hardly enough, for that proud spirit of thine proves that thy heart is not thoroughly sanctified; and though it may be right with God, thy words do not sound like it, and thine actions do not pourtray the holiness of thy nature. It is the old Adam within thee that is groaning. Take heed if thou murmurest, for it will go hard with murmurers. God always chastises his children twice if they do not bear the first blow patiently. I have often heard a father say, "Boy, if you cry for that you shall have something to cry for by-and-by." So, if we murmur at a little God gives us something that will make us cry. If we groan for nothing, he will give us something that will make us groan. Sit down in patience; despise not the chastening of the Lord, be not angry with him, for he is not angry with thee; say not that he deals so hardly with thee. Let humility rise up and speak—"It is well, O Lord! Just art thou in thy chastising, for I have sinned, righteous art thou in thy blows, for I need them to fetch me near to thee, for if thou dost leave me uncorrected and unchastised, I, a poor wanderer, must pass away to the gulf of death, and sink into the pit of eternal perdition." There is the first sense in which we may despise the chastening of the Lord: we may murmur under it. Secondly, we despise the chastening of the Lord when we say there is no use in it. There are certain things that happen to us in life, which we immediately set down for a providence. If a grandfather of ours should die and leave us five hundred pounds, what a merciful providence that would be! If by something strange in business we were suddenly to accumulate a fortune, that would be a blessed providence! If an accident happens, and we are preserved, and our limbs are not hurt, that is always a providence. But suppose we were to lose five hundred pounds, would not that be a providence? Suppose our establishment should break up, and business fail, would not that be a providence? Suppose we should during the accident break our leg, would not that be a providence? There is the difficulty. It is always a providence when it is a good thing. But why is it not a providence when it does not happen to be just as we please? Surely it is so; for if the one thing be ordered by God, so is the other. It is written, "I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things." But I question whether that is not despising the chastening of the Lord, when we set a prosperous providence before an adverse one, for I do think that an adverse providence ought to be the cause of as much thankfulness as a prosperous one. And if it is not, we are violating the command, "In everything give thanks." But we say, Of what use will such trial be to me?; cannot see that it can by any possibility be useful to my soul. Here I was growing in grace just now, but there is something that has damped all my ardor, and overthrown my zeal. Just now I was on the mount of assurance, and God has brought me to the valley of humiliation. Can that be any good to me? A few weeks ago I had wealth, and I distributed it in the cause of God; now I have none. What can be the use of that? All these things are against me." Now, you are despising the chastening of the Lord, when you say that is of no use. No child thinks the rod of much value. Anything in the house is of more use than that rod in his opinion. And if you were to ask the child which part of the household furniture could be dispensed with, he would like chairs, tables and everything else to remain but that; the rod he does not think of any good whatever. He despises the rod. Ah! and so do we. We think it cannot benefit us; we want to get rid of the rod and turn it away. "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord." Let me show thee how wrong thou art. What! doth thine ignorance affect to say that God is unwise? I thought it was written that he was too wise to err; and I did think that thou wast a believer, that he was too good to be unkind. And doth thy little wisdom arrogate to itself the chair of honor? Doth thy finite knowledge stand up before thy Maker and tell him he is unwise in what he doth? Wilt thou dare to say that one of his purposes shall be unfulfilled, that he does an unwise act? O then, thou art impudently arrogant I thou art impudently ignorant if thou wilt thus speak. Say not so, but bend meekly down before his superior wisdom, and say. "O God I believe that in the darkness thou art brewing light, that in the storm-clouds thou art gathering sunshine, that in the deep mines thou art fashioning diamonds, and in the beds of the sea thou art making pearls. I believe that however unfathomable may be thy designs, yet they have a bottom. Though it is in the whirlwind and in the storm, thou hast a way, and that way is good and righteous altogether. I would not have thee alter one atom of thy dispensations, it shall be just as thou wilt. I bow before thee, and I give my ignorance the word to hold its tongue, and to be silenced while thy wisdom speaketh words of right." "My son despise not thou the chastening of the Lord" by thinking that it can be of no possible service to thee. There is a third way in which men despise the chastening of the Lord, that is—we may think it dishonorable to be chastened by God. How many men have thought it to be dishonorable to be persecuted for righteousness sake! A young man for instance is in a situation in business where he has a large number of fellow workmen with him. They are accustomed to jeer him, to call him pretty titles—methodist, dissenter, presbyterian, or some other kind of name most common among the worldly; this young man for a time bears it, but still thinking it a kind of disgrace to him. He does not know how to endure it. So, after a while, teeing beaten by these jeers, and overcome by these insults, he leaves it off, because he discovers that the reproach of Christ is dishonorable to him. My son, if thou dost thus, thou despisest the chastening of the Lord. If thou thinkest that reproach for Christ's sake is a dishonor, thou judgest wrongly of it, for it is the greatest honor that can possibly happen to thee. There are many of you who count that religion is very honorable while you can be respectable in it, while you can walk in respectable society, but if the cause of God brings you into tribulation, if it engenders the laugh and jeer of the worldling, the hiss and scorn of the world, then you think it a dishonor. But my son thou dost not weigh the blessing rightly. I tell thee once again, it is the glory of a man to be chastened for God's sake. When they say all manner of evil against us falsely, we put that down not in the book of dishonor but in the scroll of glory. When they call us by opprobrious titles, we write not that down for loss, but for gain. We accept their jeers as honors, we count the vile things they cast at us in the pillory of scorn to be a donation of pearls and diamonds: we take their evil speaking, we read it by the light of the Word of God, and we discover that in it lie music, notes of honor and chords of glory to us for ever. Now you who faint under a little trouble, and despise the chastening of the Lord, let me encourage you in this way. My son, despise not the persecution. Remember how many men have borne it. What an honor it is to suffer for Christ's sake! because the crown of martyrdom has been worn by many heads better than thine. Oh! methinks it would be the greatest dignity I could ever attain to, if the enemy would place the blood-red crown of martyrdom around this brow! We in these gentle times cannot suffer for Christ's sake. God has put us in evil times because we cannot encounter so much as we wish for him. These times are not good for us. We almost wish for different ones, when we might be more partakers with Christ in his sufferings. We would almost envy those blessed men of yore, who had the opportunity of showing their courage and faith to all men, by enduring more for Christ; and if any of you are in a peculiar place of trouble, where you have more persecution than others, you ought to glory in it, and should be glad of it. He that stands in the thickest part of the battle shall have the highest glory at last. The old warriors would not stand and skirmish a little on the outside of the army; but what would they say? "To the center, men! to the center!" And they cut through thick and thin till they reached the place where the standard was, and the hotter the battle, the more glory the warrior felt. He could glory that he had been where shafts flew the thickest, and where lances were hurled like hail. "I have been near the standard," he could say, "I have smitten the standard-bearer down." Count it glory to go into the hottest part of the field. Fear not, man, thine head is covered in the day of battle; the shield of God can easily repel all the darts of the enemy. Be bold for his name's sake. Go on still rejoicing. But, mark thee, if thou turnest back thou art guilty of the sin of despising the cross, and despising the chastening of the Lord. Do not do so, but rather write it down for an honor and glory to be persecuted for righteousness' sake. Click Here to Download Article in PDF Format 1 \| 2 \| 3 \| 4
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Historical Reflection
Chastisement
by Charles Haddon Spurgeon

(Continued from page 1)

The first evil to which the chastened Christian is liable is this: he may despise the hand of God. The second is, that he may faint when he is rebuked. We will begin with the first: "My son despise not thou the chastening of the Lord."

I. This may be done in five ways, and in discussing the subject, I shall propose the remedy for each of these as we pass along.

First, a man may despise the chastening of the Lord when he murmurs at it. Ephraim is like a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke; when a son of God first feels the rod, he is like a bullock—he kicks at it, he cannot bear it. He is an unbroken colt, and when he first feels the collar put upon his shoulders, he rears in the air, and by all manner of ways expresses his aversion thereunto. The first time a child of God receives a blow from his Father's hand he may possibly turn round upon his own tender Father and murmur at him: "Why ought I to have this? Why am I thus punished and afflicted? Why should I be chastised? What have I done to be afflicted and chastened? "You will wonder, perhaps, that a man who has grace in his heart should talk like this; but in reality we do say so—not with the words of our lips, but with the thoughts of our hearts, for we sit down and say, "I am the man who hath seen affliction—I am the man more tried and troubled than others. No one is ever chastened as I am." And we look around with the eye of jealousy exclaiming, "That man is happier than I—that man has less sorrow and suffering." We are too apt to put our own condition in the worst place, and describe ourselves as being the most afflicted of all God's people. Though we blush to say it, it is true. There are murmurers in the midst of Israel now, as well as in the camp of Israel of old; there are people of God who, when the rod falls, cry out against it, who, instead of kissing the Son lest he be angry, turn round upon him, and speak against the afflictive dispensations of God. We know ourselves what it is when we have a little sickness to be so cross, that hardly anybody dares to speak to us, and if we have a little pain, perhaps in our head, we know what it is to think all the world is going wrong, and to be grieved, and vexed, and melancholy on that account. Many of you have been foolish enough when bereaved of your property, to cry out, "Ah! God takes everything away. He smites me with one stroke upon another. Surely he is an unkind God." And you have felt when you have lost your friends that you could not say, "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name of the Lord." You have thought, "Oh! wherefore this? Simon is not, and Joseph is not, and now ye would take Benjamin away. All these things are against me "We have murmured, now listen to the exhortation: "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord." That is despising God's chastening, when we murmur at it. Patience is the only way to receive it. A want of resignation shows we despise God's chastening hand.

A word with thee, O murmurer! Why shouldst thou murmur against the dispensations of thy heavenly Father? Can he treat thee more hardly than thou deservest? Consider what a rebel thou wast once, but he has pardoned thee. Surely if he chooses now to lay the rod upon thee, thou needest not cry out. Hast thou not read, that amongst the Roman emperors of old it was the custom when they would set a slave at liberty, to give him a blow upon the head, and then say, "Go free?" This blow which thy Father gives thee is a token of thy liberty, and dost thou grumble because he smites thee rather hardly? After all, are not his strokes fewer than thy crimes, and lighter than thy guilt? Art thou smitten as hardly as thy sins deserve? Consider the corruption that is in thy breast, and then wilt thou wonder that there needs so much of the rod to fetch it out? Weigh thyself, and discern how much dross is mingled with thy gold, and dost thou think the fire too hot to get away so much dross as thou hast? Why, thou hast not the furnace hot enough, methinks. There is too much dross, too little fire; the rod is not laid on hardly enough, for that proud spirit of thine proves that thy heart is not thoroughly sanctified; and though it may be right with God, thy words do not sound like it, and thine actions do not pourtray the holiness of thy nature. It is the old Adam within thee that is groaning. Take heed if thou murmurest, for it will go hard with murmurers. God always chastises his children twice if they do not bear the first blow patiently. I have often heard a father say, "Boy, if you cry for that you shall have something to cry for by-and-by." So, if we murmur at a little God gives us something that will make us cry. If we groan for nothing, he will give us something that will make us groan. Sit down in patience; despise not the chastening of the Lord, be not angry with him, for he is not angry with thee; say not that he deals so hardly with thee. Let humility rise up and speak—"It is well, O Lord! Just art thou in thy chastising, for I have sinned, righteous art thou in thy blows, for I need them to fetch me near to thee, for if thou dost leave me uncorrected and unchastised, I, a poor wanderer, must pass away to the gulf of death, and sink into the pit of eternal perdition." There is the first sense in which we may despise the chastening of the Lord: we may murmur under it.

Secondly, we despise the chastening of the Lord when we say there is no use in it. There are certain things that happen to us in life, which we immediately set down for a providence. If a grandfather of ours should die and leave us five hundred pounds, what a merciful providence that would be! If by something strange in business we were suddenly to accumulate a fortune, that would be a blessed providence! If an accident happens, and we are preserved, and our limbs are not hurt, that is always a providence. But suppose we were to lose five hundred pounds, would not that be a providence? Suppose our establishment should break up, and business fail, would not that be a providence? Suppose we should during the accident break our leg, would not that be a providence? There is the difficulty. It is always a providence when it is a good thing. But why is it not a providence when it does not happen to be just as we please? Surely it is so; for if the one thing be ordered by God, so is the other. It is written, "I form the light and create darkness, I make peace and create evil. I, the Lord, do all these things." But I question whether that is not despising the chastening of the Lord, when we set a prosperous providence before an adverse one, for I do think that an adverse providence ought to be the cause of as much thankfulness as a prosperous one. And if it is not, we are violating the command, "In everything give thanks." But we say, Of what use will such trial be to me?; cannot see that it can by any possibility be useful to my soul. Here I was growing in grace just now, but there is something that has damped all my ardor, and overthrown my zeal. Just now I was on the mount of assurance, and God has brought me to the valley of humiliation. Can that be any good to me? A few weeks ago I had wealth, and I distributed it in the cause of God; now I have none. What can be the use of that? All these things are against me." Now, you are despising the chastening of the Lord, when you say that is of no use. No child thinks the rod of much value. Anything in the house is of more use than that rod in his opinion. And if you were to ask the child which part of the household furniture could be dispensed with, he would like chairs, tables and everything else to remain but that; the rod he does not think of any good whatever. He despises the rod. Ah! and so do we. We think it cannot benefit us; we want to get rid of the rod and turn it away. "My son, despise not thou the chastening of the Lord." Let me show thee how wrong thou art. What! doth thine ignorance affect to say that God is unwise? I thought it was written that he was too wise to err; and I did think that thou wast a believer, that he was too good to be unkind. And doth thy little wisdom arrogate to itself the chair of honor? Doth thy finite knowledge stand up before thy Maker and tell him he is unwise in what he doth? Wilt thou dare to say that one of his purposes shall be unfulfilled, that he does an unwise act? O then, thou art impudently arrogant I thou art impudently ignorant if thou wilt thus speak. Say not so, but bend meekly down before his superior wisdom, and say. "O God I believe that in the darkness thou art brewing light, that in the storm-clouds thou art gathering sunshine, that in the deep mines thou art fashioning diamonds, and in the beds of the sea thou art making pearls. I believe that however unfathomable may be thy designs, yet they have a bottom. Though it is in the whirlwind and in the storm, thou hast a way, and that way is good and righteous altogether. I would not have thee alter one atom of thy dispensations, it shall be just as thou wilt. I bow before thee, and I give my ignorance the word to hold its tongue, and to be silenced while thy wisdom speaketh words of right." "My son despise not thou the chastening of the Lord" by thinking that it can be of no possible service to thee.

There is a third way in which men despise the chastening of the Lord, that is—we may think it dishonorable to be chastened by God. How many men have thought it to be dishonorable to be persecuted for righteousness sake! A young man for instance is in a situation in business where he has a large number of fellow workmen with him. They are accustomed to jeer him, to call him pretty titles—methodist, dissenter, presbyterian, or some other kind of name most common among the worldly; this young man for a time bears it, but still thinking it a kind of disgrace to him. He does not know how to endure it. So, after a while, teeing beaten by these jeers, and overcome by these insults, he leaves it off, because he discovers that the reproach of Christ is dishonorable to him. My son, if thou dost thus, thou despisest the chastening of the Lord. If thou thinkest that reproach for Christ's sake is a dishonor, thou judgest wrongly of it, for it is the greatest honor that can possibly happen to thee. There are many of you who count that religion is very honorable while you can be respectable in it, while you can walk in respectable society, but if the cause of God brings you into tribulation, if it engenders the laugh and jeer of the worldling, the hiss and scorn of the world, then you think it a dishonor. But my son thou dost not weigh the blessing rightly. I tell thee once again, it is the glory of a man to be chastened for God's sake. When they say all manner of evil against us falsely, we put that down not in the book of dishonor but in the scroll of glory. When they call us by opprobrious titles, we write not that down for loss, but for gain. We accept their jeers as honors, we count the vile things they cast at us in the pillory of scorn to be a donation of pearls and diamonds: we take their evil speaking, we read it by the light of the Word of God, and we discover that in it lie music, notes of honor and chords of glory to us for ever. Now you who faint under a little trouble, and despise the chastening of the Lord, let me encourage you in this way. My son, despise not the persecution. Remember how many men have borne it. What an honor it is to suffer for Christ's sake! because the crown of martyrdom has been worn by many heads better than thine. Oh! methinks it would be the greatest dignity I could ever attain to, if the enemy would place the blood-red crown of martyrdom around this brow! We in these gentle times cannot suffer for Christ's sake. God has put us in evil times because we cannot encounter so much as we wish for him. These times are not good for us. We almost wish for different ones, when we might be more partakers with Christ in his sufferings. We would almost envy those blessed men of yore, who had the opportunity of showing their courage and faith to all men, by enduring more for Christ; and if any of you are in a peculiar place of trouble, where you have more persecution than others, you ought to glory in it, and should be glad of it. He that stands in the thickest part of the battle shall have the highest glory at last. The old warriors would not stand and skirmish a little on the outside of the army; but what would they say? "To the center, men! to the center!" And they cut through thick and thin till they reached the place where the standard was, and the hotter the battle, the more glory the warrior felt. He could glory that he had been where shafts flew the thickest, and where lances were hurled like hail. "I have been near the standard," he could say, "I have smitten the standard-bearer down." Count it glory to go into the hottest part of the field. Fear not, man, thine head is covered in the day of battle; the shield of God can easily repel all the darts of the enemy. Be bold for his name's sake. Go on still rejoicing. But, mark thee, if thou turnest back thou art guilty of the sin of despising the cross, and despising the chastening of the Lord. Do not do so, but rather write it down for an honor and glory to be persecuted for righteousness' sake.

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