chapter is taken from a book, a treatise of spiritual comfort, John Colquhoun, 1815. The designs of God in permitting some of his children to lose their spiritual comfort The throne of the incomprehensible and only wise God is established in righteousness, but at the same time it is surrounded with clouds and thick darkness. It makes darkness his pavilion round about him. His judgments are a great deep. They are too deep for us to fathom. His counsels are unsearchable and his ways of providence are passed, finding out. Therefore, when we would try to penetrate into the mysterious designs which the infinitely wise God has, in permitting any of his redeemed to lose their spiritual consolation so as to fall under spiritual trouble, and even sometimes under melancholy, it becomes as to do it with the most profound reverence and only so far as the Holy Scriptures are our guide. Now, from these we discover that the Lord allows believers to deprive themselves of their sensible comfort and to continue for a season under trouble of mind, not in order that they may thereby give the smallest degree of satisfaction to his justice for their sins. Their divine surety is endured for them the whole punishment due for all their iniquities. and so he is fully satisfied the offended justice of Jehovah. We also find that he does not permit this from any pleasure that he takes in their perplexity of soul, considered merely in itself, for his nature is so infinitely merciful that he can take no pleasure in their sorrows, considered as disunited from the purposes intended to be served by them. We likewise discern that he does not allow any of the saints to fall under depression of spirit, with a view to discourage any unregenerate sinner from coming to Christ or from entering upon a holy life. For an apostle says God cannot be tempted with evil, nor does he tempt any man. James 1 verse 13. But I humbly apprehend that he does permit them to lose their spiritual comfort so as to be disquieted in distress and spirit especially for the following purposes. Number one, that he may thereby render them more conformable to his beloved son, their head and representative in the new covenant. So delighted is Jehovah the Father with the image of his infinitely dear Son, who is the second Adam as the first born among many brethren, that he has resolved that the objects of his redeeming love shall, as much as possible, consistently, with their eternal salvation, be conformed to that image, not only in point of holiness, but of suffering, whom he foreknew, says the apostle Paul the also predestined, to be conformed to the image of his son, that he might be the firstborn among many brethren. Now, seeing that the Lord Jesus, in his state of humiliation in this world, suffered not only in his body but in his soul, God the Father has determined that the spiritual seed of Christ will resemble him in this world by suffering more or less in their souls as well as in their bodies. As Christ endured in a soul an awful suspension of divine consolation, together with a dreadful impression of vindictive wrath, so believers, in order to resemble Him, sometimes endure the hiding of their Heavenly Father's countenance, in the sense of paternal anger which they often mistake for vindictive wrath, hereby they drink of His cup. They are partakers of His suffering, and so they are able to save from experience. As He was, so were we in this world. 1 John 4 verse 17. For though they never actually experience in their trouble of soul that vindictive wrath which Christ Jesus felt in His, yet By this conformity to him, they have fellowship with him in his sufferings, and attain some small experience of the bitterness of what he endured for them. And so they learn to more highly esteem him, more ardently love him, and more gratefully remember his immense love to them. Number two. He allows them to lose their comfort for a season, so that he may make them feel more sensibly and see more clearly the deep depravity of their nature. We read that Jehovah led the Israelites through a great and terrible wilderness in which there were fiery serpents and scorpions and drought, and where there was no water, that he might humble them and test them to do them good. In the end, Deuteronomy 8 verses 15 and 16, by revealing to them what was in their hearts, in like manner he sometimes withholds his influences of comfort from believers and leaves them for a season under a depression of spirit. in order to test them, and to give them clear and more humbling discoveries of the depth and strength of the corruption which remain in them. 2 Chronicles 32 verse 31. The hearts of believers are like the waters of the sea, which in a calm appear to be clear. But no sooner does a storm arise and agitate them than they begin to cast up mire and dirt. Isaiah 57 verse 20. When Christians are at ease, they sometimes think that their corruptions are not so strong. and that their graces are not so weak as they really are. They flatter themselves that their sanctification is much further advanced than it actually is. But when their comfort is gone and their hearts are troubled, what unbelief! What pride! What deadness! What enmity against a holy God! What impatience, what murmuring, what strange unbecoming thoughts of God arise and appear in their hearts, which they could never before either feel or believe to be there. Mental trouble serves in the hand of the Holy Spirit to show them how deeply rooted, how inveterate, how malignant their depravity is. and what reason they have to be greatly ashamed and to blush before the omniscient and holy Lord God. It was upon Job's having been grievously afflicted in spirit that he discerned more vileness in his heart than he could formerly have suspected to be in it, and that he learned to deeply abhor himself as a sinner. There are abominations which, like nests of vipers, lie so quietly within that believers don't suspect they are there, till the rod of spiritual trouble disturbs and arouses them. Some corruptions lie so very deep in their hearts that they can hardly discern them, but as fire under a pot causes the scum to rise up, and run over, so trouble of mind brings up from the bottom of the heart such deep corruptions to our view as the most enlightened of the saints could otherwise scarcely have conceived were there, and discoveries especially of these are necessary to deep humiliation of spirit before the Lord. 3. Another design which God has in afflicting trouble of spirit upon some of his children is that he may thereby chasten them for their sins, and so in bitter sin to them. Disquieted of the soul is a fatherly chastisement to believers. The Lord resolves thereby to correct. He determines that by their bitterness of soul they will know and see that it is an evil thing and bitter that they have forsaken Him. Jeremiah 2 verse 19. By this most afflictive dispensation He thus speaks to each of them. Your ways and your doings have procured these things for you. This is your wickedness, because it is bitter, because it reaches to your heart. Jeremiah 4 verse 18. As the Lord never chastens any of his children except for their prophet, Habakkuk 12.10, so he never afflicts them with spiritual trouble except when it is necessary for that purpose. Accordingly, the Apostle Peter says, you are now for a season if need be in heaven through manifold temptations, 1 Peter 1 verse 6, by suspending his influences of consolation from their souls. And so, in bittering their sins to them, the Lord weakens the remains of corruption in them. He thereby renders them wiser and more circumspect. And so, He prevents much sin into which they otherwise would fall. 2 Corinthians 12 verse 7. By this painful discipline, their souls are purified and made white and tried. Daniel 12 verse 10. And so, by sad experience, they are made to feel, as well as to see, that their sin is exceedingly sinful. By withholding consolation from them for a season, he shows them the evil of their not having employed their former comfort well. of their having made for themselves the Savior their pleasant frames by relying on them rather than on Jesus Christ. By permitting distrust and despondency to prevail against them, and so occasioning much trouble and perplexity of mind for them, he teaches them the exceeding sinfulness of their unbelief and distrust. His design, in hiding his face from them, is to teach them that they did wrong in setting a small value upon his favor in the light of his countenance. If he leaves them under a painful sense of his anger, it is to make them sensible of their folly as well as ingratitude in provoking his displeasure. By piercing their hearts with deep sorrow, he teaches them the sinfulness of their having pierced his beloved son and grieved his Holy Spirit. If he makes them experience a terror of his vindictive wrath, or the dread of suffering the pains of hell through eternity. It is to teach them the extreme folly of their not having been afraid of sinning against him. One part of his design in allowing a fiery law to re-enter and distress their consciences is to make them deeply sensible of the great evil of their legal spirit. By permitting them for a time to lose sight of their evidences of grace, he teaches them that they should never be proud of their attainments in religion nor trust in received grace. If he appears not to stand in the relation of a father to them, it is to render them more sensible that they have not acted the part of obedient children to him. By seeming to shut out their prayers, he reproves them for restraining prayer, Job 15.4, and for their unbelieving, wandering, and vain thoughts in prayer. When he permits them to be afraid that they are yet under the dominion of spiritual death, it is to teach them the great evil of deadness and coldness of heart and their acts of worship. If he denies them his reviving and consoling presence and reading and hearing his blessed word, it is to make them deeply sensible of the sinfulness of their having despised his glorious gospel. And if he lets any of them fall into some gross and open sin, his design may be to chasten them for having allowed themselves to commit secret iniquity. By thus chastening them, the Lord instructs them in the exceeding sinfulness of their sin. In order that they may so be well and abhor it, is to turn from it with fuller determination of heart, and turn to him as a gracious God and Father. Hereby he also teaches them that if he leaves them but for a single moment, they will instantly fall even into the most atrocious crimes. Oh, how deep, how inveterate is their disease when a potion so bitter is requisite to accomplish their cure. 4. The Lord withholds consolation from some of his people and allows them for a season to walk in darkness in order to test and exercise their graces. Hereby, the graces of the Spirit in them are tried and proved, and their truth, as well as their weakness or strength, is manifested to them. Now, for a season, says the Apostle Peter, you are in heaviness. You are grieved, through manifold temptations, that the trial of your faith, being much more precious than gold that perishes, though it is stride with fire, might be found to praise, honor, and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ, 1 Peter 1, 6, and 7. No affliction is so grievous and so trying. It's spiritual distress. Therefore, the Lord sometimes inflicts spiritual trouble upon believers in order that he may try their faith and other graces, and so reveal these to them. It appears to have been one of the designs of Job's spiritual trouble, to try and so to manifest to himself and others a strong faith and the invincible patience which God had given him. There are some graces in the heart of a holy man which are revealed more clearly to him by means of spiritual trouble than by any external affliction. When he finds that he has been unable to trust in the Lord Jesus at the very time in which he was frowning upon Him, and seeming even to slay him, to love him for himself. When he had no reviving sense of God's love to him and to follow him with longings and prayers in the midst of darkness and discouragement, this is afterwards a clear proof to him of the reality of these graces in his soul. Trouble of mind during its continuance renders the exercise of graces and the performance of duties peculiarly difficult. If believers then, when they are under spiritual distress, still continue to cling in some degree to God and Christ, and to so love Him as to prefer Him before every other object of affection, even when He seems to be casting off their souls, and to be shutting out their prayers, When they afterwards reflect upon it, this will be an evidence to them that they are sincere, and that their love to Him is supreme. Moreover, when they are enabled under that most grievous trial to exercise their graces in some degree, those graces are not only manifested to their consciences, but are strengthened and increased by their exercise of them. The same affliction that serves in the hand of the Holy Spirit to test and reveal their graces also serves to excite them to exercise, and the more they are exercised, the more the habit of them is strengthened. When the Lord does chasten any of His dear children, it is invariably for their profit. so that they may be partakers of its holiness. For this chastening, though for the present it is not, joyous but grievous, it yields a peaceable fruit of righteousness for those who are exercised by it." Hebrews 12, 10, and 11. It supplies them in the meantime with special occasions for striving and wrestling against their spiritual enemies. for swimming against a stream, for pressing on through an opposing crowd, and thus their graces have special opportunities afforded them of becoming stronger by frequent exercise. It affords occasion for many actings of faith and love, of repentance and resignation, and for many ardent longings and heavenly breathings which otherwise perhaps would not be experienced. Besides, the exercises of the graces of His Holy Spirit in believers, especially of that grace in which each of them excels, is so pleasing to the Lord that He will on no account allow them to lack occasion, indeed frequent occasion, for such exercise. 5. His design in withholding consolation is also to teach them by experience their continual need of living upon Christ by faith. and so to render him more precious to them. I will leave in the midst of you, says Jehovah, an afflicted and poor people, and they shall trust in the name of the Lord. Zephaniah 3 verse 12. Paul and Timothy had the sentence of death in themselves, that they should not trust in themselves but in God who raises the dead. 2 Corinthians 1.9 It is not enough to say saints merely believe their need every moment to fresh supplies of grace from the fullness of Christ. They must be made to see and feel that need. Nor is it sufficient for them merely to believe that it is their duty at all times to trust in Him for those supplies. They must be made to see clearly and feel deeply their extreme need to do so. They must, by experience, be made deeply sensible that without a fresh supply of grace at the time, they are as unable to perform spiritually a single duty as they were in their unregenerate state. So very unwilling are they to believe this and to regulate their spiritual exercise according to it, yet ordinarily they must be trained for it by sad experience. Now the Lord suspends influences of comfort for many of them, and for a season inflicts on them a greater or lesser degree of mental trouble, in order to make them see and feel how much need to have at all times to trust in Christ for continued supplies from His fullness. and to render them deeply sensible, that they cannot otherwise perform even the least degree of acceptable obedience and by trusting solely and firmly in him for new communications of sanctifying grace, to enable him to perform it, to trust daily and with unsuspecting confidence in the great trustee of the new covenant, that he will by his Holy Spirit work in them both to will and to do, Philippians 2 verse 13. is of such necessity and importance to their growing ingrace that rather than leave them ignorant of it, God will teach His children, even by the most painful discipline, how needful it is to do so. He will permit them to feel what anguish has sold their neglecting the daily exercise of faith in the Lord Jesus will occasion to them. in order that he may reduce them to the happy necessity of placing at all times the confidence of their hearts in him alone, and to do this for comforting as well as sanctifying influences. He will embitter a life of sense to them, so that he may dispose them to relish a life of faith. He will make them know by experience what trust in their habits of grace has procured for them, that they may discern the exceeding sinfulness of a legal spirit And see that without faith, or the daily exercise of direct confidence in the incarnate Redeemer, it will be impossible for them to please Him. Hebrews 6, verse 6. The death of their sensible comfort will shew them the necessity of a life of faith. The Lord gives to many of His saints frightful discoveries of sin and wrath. In order to that, by being shaken, they may learn to rely more firmly on the sure foundation which He has laid in Zion. Isaiah 28, 16. He hides himself from them and delays helping them until they are in extremity, so that they may learn the high and difficult art of living by faith and not by sight. Living by signs of grace is most natural and pleasing to them. but living by faith is most acceptable to God. The sight of their evidences of grace, indeed, cannot fail to be delightful to them, but the sight of Jesus by faith ought to be a thousand times more delightful. And when they pour so much and so long upon their evidences as to thereby be prevented from direct and frequent actings of trust in the Savior, they so far dishonor and displease Him. When they build their comfort and hope upon their evidences, instead of building all their comfort and all their hope upon him, they at once greatly dishonor him and deeply injure themselves. Thus, they render it necessary that he hide his face. cloud their evidences, and wither their comforts. This is an order that they may learn to prefer Him before their clearest evidences and liveliest frames, to set a higher value on the husband of their souls than on the bracelets and jewels which they receive from Him. And that, in the absence of evidences and frames, they may study the art of living above them, living upon Him, who is their life and consolation, their hope, and their all in all. In his manner he wisely and graciously trains them as sinners to trust in himself and to rely on him, not as felt by them, but as offered to them, and to depend on him alone, and stay upon him as theirs in the gospel offer when feelings and comforts fail them. It's nothing done by believers glorifies a great redeemer so much as their acting particular trust in him for salvation. So if necessary, he would rather hide every other object of confidence from their view than allow them to continue resting on it instead of trusting in him. Psalm 42 verses 4 and 5. In a few words, his grand design is to render himself and his redeeming grace more precious to them, to show them experientially that none but himself can calm the tumults of a troubled soul, Isaiah 57, 19, and that without him they can do nothing that is spiritually good. Number six. Another end which the Lord proposes to himself and afflicting believers with trouble of mind is that they may be stirred up to search the scriptures more earnestly and more frequently. It is to make them capable of relishing and esteeming more His glorious Gospel. One great design of the doctrines and promises of Sacred Scripture is to comfort the saints under their manifold afflictions. Accordingly, most of the precious promises are adapted and made to them. It's considered in circumstances of trouble. For although they ascend to the truth of them, they cannot so well and so fillingly experience the suitableness and sweetness of them, unless they are sometimes brought into the circumstances to which they refer. The Lord says, Call upon me in a day of trouble. I will deliver you. Psalm 50 verse 15. I will be with him in trouble. I will deliver him and honor him. Psalm 91 verse 15. I have seen his ways and will heal him. I will lead him also and restore comfort to him and to his mourners. Isaiah 57 18. Now till the day of trouble comes, believers do not know by experience either the use or value of such promises as these because they are not in the condition in which they relate. Were they to continue long without affliction, and especially without some degree of spiritual trouble, they would be, at least many of them would be, only slightly affected by the doctrines and promises of the gospel. This is because they could not feel their need of that consolation which many of these are designed to afford. If they had no burdens to weigh them down, no fears to disquiet them, no distress of conscience to exercise them, then much of the good word of God would be of comparatively little use to them. Without such trouble in a greater or lesser degree, the saints could not have an opportunity to experience the truth, suitableness, and sweetness of many of the promises. They could not feel the need nor understand the true meaning of a great part of the Bible. Indeed, if believers were always triumphing in the unmingled light of God's countenance, they would thereby, as one expresses it, be cut off from half of the promises of the gospel. In order, then, that they may feel their need of all the declarations and promises of the blessed gospel, and so be trained up to set such a high value on the Scriptures, As to search them carefully and diligently, the Lord sometimes permits them to fall under distress of mind. At those times, a sense of need urges them to look eagerly and frequently into His blessed Word in order to see if there are any doctrines or directions or promises in it suited to revive their drooping spirits or to console their disquieted souls. And when they find any passages of it, as sooner or later they will, which through grace of Lord direction or consolation to their troubled souls, then each of them will be able to say from experience with the holy psalmist, this is my comfort and my affliction, for your word has quickened me. Psalm 119 verse 50. Your testimonies also are my delight and my counselor. Psalm 119 verse 24. It is good for me that I've been afflicted, that I might learn your statutes.