MANIFOLD TEMPTATIONS

"Wherein ye greatly rejoice, though now for a season, it need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations." - I Peter 1:6.

     The fisherman of Galilee had not learned to suffer with Jesus. Mounts and miracles may strengthen one's faith in the deity of Christ, but such experiences alone will leave the feet so soft and tender that they are liable to be mercilessly torn by the thorns of afflictions. Weeping Jeremiah, up from the miry dungeon, could say, "I am the man that hath seen affliction by the rod of His wrath," but in spite of his anguish he could add, "The Lord is my portion, saith my soul; therefore will I hope in Him." Delectable mountains ravish our souls and give them wings of delight; valleys of afflictions try our graces, shake up our roots, and, if we remain faithful, settle us deeper in God.

     Peter had been given so many revelations that for his own good he must be tried. He had lived in the inner and most select circle of the disciples, Peter, James and John touched nearest to the heart of their Master. Simon Barjona knew and loved his Lord so well that he vowed he would never leave Him but be spoke too quick, he had not yet entered the furnace. Afflictions suddenly came heaping on and that so heavily that he slept for sorrow of heart. Now is the time, Peter, to build tabernacles; now is the time to show a practical love for the object of your affections. Can you not suffer with Him one little hour? Do you not know that a suffering love is more to be honored than a rejoicing love?

     Oh, poor, weak; stumbling humanity! How apt are we, like Peter, to fall down in the furnace, and by our weakness to add fuel to the fires of our already manifold trials!

     It is all right to rejoice, but we should not become so engrossed in our rejoicing that we will fail when reverses come. After all there is something in sorrows which are borne aright that is salutary and helpful to the soul.

     The best frame of mind is that of entire, uncompromising resignation to the will of God. If offenses come, why should I complain and curse the rod? This rod and these offenses may be but a goad in the hands of an all-loving Father to drive me towards heaven. How do I know but that they may be a necessity to my eternal salvation? Avrillon wrote: "As the sweetest and most exquisite honey is obtained only from the sweetest and most odoriferous flowers which contain it, my lips cannot sing hymns that shall please my heavenly Spouse, unless my heart, from whence they emanate, and which produces them, be pure, and my love for Him undivided and without alloy. Yet, O God of Purity, I cannot labor alone for the purification of this heart, because I am weak and blind. Assist me, enlighten me, to know and to cleanse the least stains which are displeasing to Thine eyes, and which escape my self-love. Sprinkle me with hyssop, that I may be clean, and that this salutary bitterness may destroy in me the taste of every sweet which comes not from thee. Wash me also with the pure waters of victorious grace, that I may become whiter than snow: or rather, Lord, send from the throne of flames and fire whereon Thou sittest, divine ardors which may instruct, enlighten, and inflame me, and which may consume in my heart even the smallest defilements with which it is stained."

     "For a season, if need be, ye are in heaviness through manifold temptations." Great rejoicing in the midst of many temptations! "As sorrowful, yet always rejoicing!" "Blessed are ye that mourn, for ye shall be comforted."

     The apostle seems to teach that there may be times when "manifold temptations" are a necessity. Paul needed a thorn in the flesh, a messenger of Satan to buffet him, lest be should be exalted above measure, and thus lose his soul. The ancient world needed the flood; Sodom, a rain of fire and brimstone; Capernaum, which was exalted to heaven, must be brought down to hell; Jerusalem, whose pride caused her to stone the prophets and pierce the Son of God, must be overthrown; these all refused correction and perished. But not all who are humbled are thus destroyed. Moses, in the back side of the desert, humbled, but praying, met God; David, from the wilderness and eaves of Judea, arose to the throne; Paul, from a three years' sojourn in the deserts of Arabia, became the chiefest of the apostles; Joseph, in the face of fearful temptations, was true to God, and from the dungeon was exalted to royal honors; Israel came forth from Egypt's iron furnace with shoes of brass and iron and garments that lasted forty years, a terror to evil nations, and even wicked Balaam heard the shout of a king among them.

     Did temptations ever heap on your soul till you feared your life would be crushed out? Did you ever try to dig your way out of the maze, turning over one layer after another with so little success that you feared you would never reach daylight? This is manifold temptations. Such trials must produce more or less heaviness.

     At the foundation and as the primary cause of all temptations is the devil. As in the beginning he is still bent on the destruction of mankind, and will do all that diabolical ingenuity can contrive to accomplish his end. Unless it is his "infernal offspring," carnality, from which you are delivered if your heart is cleansed, you can have no more dangerous foe. As a lion he roars on his prey; as a tiger he crouches to spring on the unsuspecting; as a serpent he would beguile; as foaming waves of the sea he would devour the helpless; as lurking malaria he would steal away our strength; he is everything cruel and designing, no means are too low for him to use to accomplish his ends.

     The needs of each individual are so varied and so often cross the rights of others that trials must come. Good people will misunderstand us and bad people will mistreat us; those who love us will flatter, those who hate will slander, and indifferent ones will pass coldly by; differences real and imaginary are sure to arise (and imaginary differences are liable to be worse than real differences); the tendency of all this is to produce heaviness and calls for the exercise of the grace of long-suffering.

     At times everything seems to go wrong, all our plans fail, our hopes are disappointed, friends shun us, foes deride us, crops fail, banks break up, our job is gone, sickness comes, death rends the family, these things and others, single-handed or by the dozen, add to the weight of temptations already too heavy for human endurance.

     To all this add the natural tendency of the human mind to magnify difficulties, to listen to the devil and be annoyed by other circumstances; the natural appetites and desires clamoring for gratification, and persistence of false doctrines, and many other things, ad infinitum, which all at once come rolling over our heads like billows and threaten our destruction.

     Can any soul in such a strait keep from declaring with the Psalmist, "Thou has laid me in the lowest pit, in darkness, in the deeps. Thy wrath lieth hard upon me, and Thou hast afflicted me with all Thy waves. I am shut up, and I cannot come forth "?

     My brother, did you ever stop to consider that all these multiplied trials can be turned into a blessing? and that you can have so much grace that each added difficulty will only be an added reason for greater attainments?

     Trials, if borne in the Spirit, soften, subdue, melt and humble the soul. Let them heap on, trial upon trial, burden on burden, misunderstandings, bereavements, sickness, weakness, and all the rest, just set your face heavenward, plant your feet on the promises and look to Jesus and you will come off more than conqueror.

     The following is from James Caughey: "There are herbs, you know, whose virtue consists chiefly in their fragrance, but some of them are quite scentless and uninteresting till bruised: then they shed their perfume all around. Thus it is with many a Christian. The fragrance of his piety is never diffused abroad until he is well bruised; till

     "Hell has won its will,

     To wring his soul with agony!"

     Our prayers and meditations,' said a good man "like hot spices, are most fragrant when our hearts are bruised in God's mortar, and broken with afflictions and troubles." When such a one, after a day or week of trial, speaks in a class or love-feast, an influence from heaven descends upon all around. I have frequently observed this, and have felt, with the poet,

     "Tis even as if an angel shook his wings-

     Immortal fragrance fills the circuit wide."