Comforted and Comforting
(No. 2640)
INTENDED FOR READING ON LORD'S-DAY, SEPTEMBER 17, 1899,
DELIVERED BY C. H. SPURGEON,
AT THE METROPOLITAN TABERNACLE, NEWINGTON, ON THURSDAY EVENING, JUNE
15, 1882.
"Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father
of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforts us in all our
tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any
trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God." 2
Corinthians 1:3, 4.
THE Apostle was a much-tried man and he lived in an age when all
Believers were peculiarly tried. The persecutions of that time were
excessively severe and every man who called himself a Christian had to
carry his life in his hands. In this tribulation, the Apostle had the
largest share, because he was the most prominent and indefatigable
teacher that the Church of Christ then possessed. We have, here, a
little insight into his inner life. He needed comfort and he received
it. And be had it in such abundance that he became a comforter of
others. Although, without Christ, he would have been, "of all men most
miserable," I think I may say that with Christ and the blessed hope of
the Resurrection, he was among all men, one of the most happy.
In our text there are four things of which I would speak to you, dear
Friends, hoping that they may bring good cheer to any who are cast
down. The first is the comforting occupation in which Paul was
employing himself–he was blessing God. "Blessed be God." Then,
secondly, we have the comforting titles which he gives to God–"The
Father of our Lord Jesus Christ. The Father of mercies and the God of
all comfort." Truly, they who know the Lord's name do put their trust
in Him. Paul knew the name of God right well and he used the most
appropriate name for the time of sorrow. Then, thirdly, we shall have
to consider for a little while the comforting fact which the Apostle
here states, "Who comforts us in all our tribulation." And, lastly, we
shall try to see the comforting design of it all–"That we may be able
to comfort them which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we
ourselves are comforted of God."
I. First, then, you who mourn and are troubled and cast down, are
invited to consider THE COMFORTING OCCUPATION of the Apostle.
Most of Paul's 14 Epistles begin with praise to God and he often breaks
out into a doxology when you are hardly expecting it. He lays down his
pen, bows his knees to the God and Father of the Lord Jesus Christ and
pours out a flood of thanksgiving to the Most High. Here was a man who
never knew but what he might be dead the next day, for his enemies were
many, and cruel, and mighty. And yet he spent a great part of his time
in praising and blessing God!
This comforting occupation argues that his heart was not crushed and
vanquished by his troubles. Paul was sore beset in many ways, yet he
could say, and he did say, "Blessed be God." Job was greatly tried and
sorely bereaved, but he still said, "The Lord gave, and the Lord has
taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord." And as long as we can
keep the blessing of God to the front, it is a sure sign that whatever
the adversary may have been able to take away from us, he has not taken
away our confidence, which has great recompense of reward and, whatever
he may have crushed, he has not crushed our heart! He may have
surrounded it with bitterness, but the heart itself is not made
bitter–it is a fountain that sends out a stream of sweet waters, such
as this utterance of the Apostle, "Blessed be God."
It is glorious to see how the Grace of God will enable a man to endure
all the assaults of the world, the flesh and the devil–how he will be
laid aside by sickness and his pains will be multiplied. How reproach
may go far to break his heart, how he may be depressed in spirit and
lose all temporal benefits–and yet he will still be able to say,
"Blessed be the name of the Lord." "Though He slay me, yet will I trust
in Him." "Let Him do what He pleases with me, I have made no
stipulation with Him that I will only praise Him when He does according
to my will. I will praise Him when He has His own way with me, even
though it runs exactly contrary to mine." It is a brave heart that
still, under all pressures, gives forth only this cry, "Blessed be
God." O dear Friends, if you want to keep up your hearts–if you desire
to be established and sustained, if you wish to prevent the enemy from
overcoming you–let this be your comfortable occupation and say with
the poet–
"I will praise You every day, Now Your anger's turned away."
Nothing can keep your head above the waters of trouble better than
crying, "Bless the Lord, O my Soul: and all that is within me, bless
His holy name."
This occupation shows that the Apostle had not gratified Satan, for the
devil's purpose, so far as he has had to do with our trouble, is to
make us "curse God and die." After all the sorrow that Satan was
permitted to bring to Job, the Patriarch's heart still blessed the name
of the Lord! So the devil was defeated–he could not carry out his own
evil purpose and he had to slink away like a whipped cur–for Job
glorified God instead of bringing dishonor upon His holy name. The
tried and troubled ones who can still cry, "Blessed be the name of the
Lord," are not driven to despair, for despair shuts the mouth and makes
a man sit in sullen silence, or else it opens his lips in bitter
complaints and in multiplied murmurings. But, when a man can truly say,
"Blessed be God," then despair has not mastered him. He still holds his
own and he has on his side a far greater force than the devil–and the
most trying circumstances–can bring to bear upon him to vanquish him!
O Friends, if you are afraid of being overcome, take to praising God!
If you are in trouble and do not know how to bear it, divert your
thoughts by praising God! Get away from the present trial by blessing
and magnifying His holy name!
Next, this state of mind which made the Apostle say, "Blessed be God,"
prophesied that God would speedily send him something to call forth new
praises. When a man blesses God for the bitter, the Lord often sends
him the sweet. If he can praise God in the night, the daylight is not
far off. There never was a heart that waited and wanted to praise God
but the Lord soon gave it opportunities of lifting up Psalms and hymns
and spiritual songs to Him. It shall never be said that we were ready
to praise God, but that God was not ready to bless us! So, dear
Friends, praise God and He will bless you! Praise God and exalt Him,
and He will soon lift you up out of your troubles. I look upon a
murmuring spirit as the forewarning of stormy weather in a rebellious
soul–and I regard a praiseful spirit as the forecast of a happy time
to come to the loyal joyous soul. God has prepared the heart to receive
the joy which, otherwise, it might not have been fit to accept at His
hands. Be comforted, then, dear Friends, if you find in your hearts the
desire to praise God–and belief that the Lord will find in His heart
the willingness to speedily bless you!
This comforting occupation profits the Believer in many ways. One
advantage of blessing God is that it takes a man's thoughts off his own
trials and sorrows. We make our troubles much greater than they need be
by turning them over, considering them from all points of view,
weighing them and thinking and meditating upon them. You know very well
that if you swallow a pill, you do not taste it–but if you get it
between your teeth and bite and chew it, you will get all the bitter
flavor of the drug. So, it is often a good thing to let our afflictions
go right down into our soul, to swallow them at once, and say no more
about them. God has sent them and, therefore, they are for your
good–but when you keep brooding over your grief, you will probably
hatch something out of it which you did not expect–it may be that you
will find a young scorpion come from it to annoy you! They that will
always be thinking upon their trials will soon find a sorrow within the
sorrow which, haply, they might never have perceived if they had let it
go! While we are blessing God, we are, at least for the time, taking
our thoughts off our troubles and, so far, so good.
Moreover, we shall, by God's gracious help, while we are praising Him,
be lifting our soul out of our sorrow. In America, for many years they
kept a day of fasting, but somebody suggested that they had better keep
an annual day of thanksgiving–and they have done so ever since! The
change was a good one and you and I, though sometimes we must fast,
especially if the Bridegroom shall hide His face, will also find that
it is a great improvement when we can turn our day of fasting into a
day of thanksgiving! Do you not think, dear Friends, that sometimes,
when you are very heavy of heart, it would be the best possible thing
if you were to say, with Martin Luther, "Come, let us sing a Psalm and
startle the devil"? If you sit down and groan and complain against God,
your groans will be music to Satan's malevolent heart!
But you will vex and grieve him, if, instead of doing so, you say, "No,
foul fiend, you shall never persuade me to rob God of His Glory–He
shall have His full revenue of praise from me, whether I am on my bed,
sick, or able to be up and actively engaged in the duties of my
calling. Whether I stand well with my fellow men, or my name has an ill
savor to them, God's name has not an ill savor and, therefore, I will
praise and bless Him even though nobody will praise me."
O Beloved, if your heart is sad within you, praising God will so lift
it up that you will even be able to forget the trouble of the present
hour! What does the eagle do when the fowler is about with his net and
gun? Why, the noble bird takes to his wings and flies upwards towards
the sun! And, though his bright eyes can see the foe, he knows that no
bullet can reach him at that great height. So, if you Christians have
close communion with your God and praise and magnify His holy name, the
shots of the enemy shall not reach you–you will have risen far beyond
their range. Therefore, you see the excellence of blessing and praising
the Most High.
Besides, this occupation may well tend to take away the sorrows of our
mortality, since, by praising God, we get a taste of the joys of
immortality. What are the angels doing now? I cannot tell you what men
all over the world are doing, but I can tell you what the angels are
doing! The holy spirits before the Throne of God find it is their very
Heaven to be always blessing their God! So, if you want a sip of
Heaven's bliss. If on your leaf you would have a sparkling dew-drop
which would tell you what the River of Life that flows at the right
hand of God is like, commence at once to praise and bless the Lord your
God–
"I would begin the music here, And so my soul would rise! Oh for some
heavenly notes to bear My passions to the skies!"
And there is no better way of anticipating the joys of being there than
by beginning the praises of God while here!
You may also destroy your distresses by singing praises to God. By
blessing the Lord, you may set your foot upon the neck of your
adversaries–you can sing yourself right up from the deeps by God's
gracious help. Out of the very depths you may cry unto the Lord till He
shall lift you up and you shall praise Him in excelsis–in the very
highest–and magnify His name! I give you this as one of the shortest
and surest recipes for comfort–begin to praise God. The next time that
a friend comes in to see you, do not tell him how long the wind has
been blowing from the North, how cold the weather is for this season of
the year, how your poor bones ache, how little you have coming in and
all your troubles–he has probably heard the sad story many times
before! Instead of that, tell him what the Lord has done for you and
make him feel that the Lord is good. Your griefs and your troubles
speak for themselves, but your mercies are often dumb–so try,
therefore, to give them a tongue and praise the Lord with all your
heart!
II. Time would fail me if I dwelt, as I would like to dwell, upon the
first point, so we must advance to the second, which is, THE COMFORTING
TITLES which the Apostle gives to God in our text.
The first title we may call a name of affinity–"Blessed be God, even
the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ." Oh, how near that brings God to
us–that He is the Father of Jesus, the Father of Christ, "the Father
of our Lord Jesus Christ"–because Jesus has espoused our nature and
become a Man. Though He is, "Light of light" and, "very God of very
God," yet is He also our Brother! "Father of Jesus"–what a delightful
title that is for the good and glorious God! The great Jehovah has
become very near of kin to you, my sorrowing Brother, for His Son is
your Brother, your Husband, your Head and, now, the Father of Jesus is
the Father of every Believer, so He is your Father if you are one of
those who trust His Son! A child may not have a penny in his pocket,
yet he feels quite rich enough if he has a wealthy father. You may be
very, very poor, but, oh, what a rich Father you have! Jesus Christ's
Father is your Father! And as He has exalted His own dear Son, He will
do the same for you in due time. Our Lord Jesus is the first-born among
many brethren and the Father means to treat the other brethren even as
He treats Him. Your Father has made you one of His heirs– yes, a joint
heir with Jesus Christ–what more would you have? Therefore, comfort
yourself with this blessed Truth of God! If you are distressed and
troubled, this fact–that God is Christ's Father and your Father–ought
to be quite sufficient, by the blessing of the Holy Spirit, to fill you
with intense joy!
In addition to this name of affinity, Paul gives to God a title which
is a name of gratitude–"The Father of mercies." Then every mercy I
have ever had has been begotten of God, who is "the Father of mercies"!
All temporal mercies come to God's people from their Father. It is He
who gives us bread to eat and clothes to put on. We are happy to be
able to see in these common mercies a peculiar touch of the benign
hand. But as for the high and heavenly mercies, the everlasting
mercies, the satisfying mercies–the soul-filling mercies–these all
come from God! As every beam of light comes from the father of lights
[the sun], so do all mercies come from God. As all the rivers would be
dried up if the sea were dry–for that is the ultimate source of the
earth's moisture–so would all our mercies be dried-up mercies, barren
mercies, no mercies at all if they did not come from that great ocean
of mercies, the God and Father of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ!
Well, now, Beloved, as your Father is "the Father of mercies," can you
not go to Him for all the mercy you need? If your mercies seem, just
now, to be very few, can you not go to the All-Merciful and ask Him to
deal out to you from His abundant store, for, "His mercy endures
forever"?
The third title which Paul applies to God ought to afford the deepest
possible consolation to your soul. I venture to call it a name of hope.
"The God of all comfort." All sorts of comforts are stored up in God.
No matter what you may require to bear you up under your affliction,
God has just the kind of comfort which you need–and He is ready to
bestow it upon you! Rest assured of that and also believe that He will
bestow it upon you if you ask it at His hands. Oh, I think this is a
name full of good cheer to everyone who has grown weary because of the
trials of the way through this great and terrible wilderness! God is
the God of all comfort–not merely of some comfort, but of allcomfort.
If you need every kind of comfort that was ever given to men, God has
it in reserve and He will give it to you! If there are any comforts to
be found by God's people in sickness, in prison, in need, in
depression–the God of all comfort will deal them out to you according
as you have need of them!
This title is also a name of discrimination. It applies both to the
persons and to the comfort–"who comforts us…by the comfort wherewith
we are comforted of God." There are some things which are called
comforts of which God is not the dispenser. Alas, alas, how many
persons there are who fly to the bottle when they are in distress! That
is their comfort–they drink and, for a while, forget their misery–but
the process only leads to still greater misery and degradation. We
cannot say that God is the God of such comfort as that! Indeed, we do
not reckon it to be comfort! Some there are who turn to dissipation
that they may forget their grief. God is not the God of dissipation
and, therefore, that is not a comfort to a child of God–it would only
increase his misery. If he were to be dragged to it, it would not
relieve his pains in the least. Whatever there is in the world–and
there are many such things which men call comforts–if you cannot be
sure that they are such as God sends, let them be no source of
consolation to you, but rather regard them with horror! May every child
of God be able to make this discrimination and say, "If God does not
give me what I look upon as a comfort, it will not prove to be a
comfort."
It is not a creature who supplies the comfort, it is only the Creator.
The comfort may be brought to us by a creature, and brought in God's
name, but it must come from Him! The reason why bread feeds us is
because God chooses to make it do so. When medicine heals us, it is
because Jehovah makes it the means of healing. But if God does not work
with the means, no cure will be worked. You who have the Creator,
Himself, as your Comforter, are like the man who has a well in his
garden–he may not have a tap to turn it off and on when he needs a
supply of water to run through the pipe, but he has the well, itself,
from which he may draw as much as he needs. Remember what we sang just
now–
"Why should the soul a drop bemoan, Who has a fountain near? A fountain
which will always run With waters sweet and clear?"
So much, then, upon the comforting titles which Paul uses in relation
to God. I pray you to act like the bees when they dive into the petals
of the flowers and suck out their honey–dive into these titles and
extract the delicious honey which the Holy Spirit has stored there for
you.
III. Now, thirdly, I am to speak of THE COMFORTING FACT which Paul here
mentions. "The God of all comfort .. .comforts us in all our
tribulation."
This was Paul's declaration and I, also, may speak in the name of many
here present and say, "That is not only true of Paul, and the
Christians in his day, but it is also true of us." The God of all
comfort has comforted us in our tribulation. Look back, now, on the
pages of your diary that bear the record of your sorrow–do they not
also bear the record of the Lord's help in the sorrow and His
deliverance from the sorrow? If I cannot speak for all of you, I will
speak for myself. I must do so, or else surely the very timber on which
I stand might cry out against me! The Lord has been very gracious to me
in many an hour of affliction. Blessed be His name, He has never failed
to bring the solace when He has made the smart–and if there has been
the stroke with the rod, there has very soon been the caress of His
love to follow the blow of His hand. It has been so with many of us.
But Paul speaks in the present tense–"Who comforts us in all our
tribulation"–and we can also declare that God is now comforting us who
believe in Jesus. Did you, Beloved, come into this building somewhat
heavy in spirit? You are not half so heavy, now, as you were–and if
you will take the good advice I am trying to give, you will go away
quite relieved. Rutherford used to say that the Cross of Christ was no
more a burden to the man who knew how to carry it than wings are to a
bird or sails are to a ship! An affliction is a help to us, not a
hindrance, when Grace comes with it to sanctify it! Remember what David
said, long ago–"Cast your burden upon the Lord and He shall sustain
you: He shall never suffer the righteous to be moved." But if you cast
your burden upon the Lord, do not go looking for it when I have
pronounced the benediction–leave it altogether! The fault with many of
us is that when we have cast our burden upon the Lord, we beg Him to
let us have it back! And if He grants our foolish request, it comes
back twice as heavy as it was before. Oh, that we were wise enough to
leave our troubles with our Father who is in Heaven as little children
leave things with their father! Then we shall find that He comforts us
in all our tribulation.
Yes, but our text is true of the future as well as the present. Here,
if we cannot speak by experience, we can speak by faith. A little child
who loves his father has no doubt about his father's comforting him
next year as well as this. And you must have no doubt about what God
will do for you, dear Friends, especially you aged ones. When the
veterans begin to waver and doubt, I do not know what excuse to make
for them. I remember the story of one who said she was afraid she would
be starved. Someone asked her, "How old are you?" "Seventy-five," she
replied. "How long have you been a Christian?" "Fifty years." "Your
Heavenly Father has fed you these 50 years and yet you fear that He
will let you starve during the last few years you are likely to be
here?" It was very wrong of the poor old soul–mind that you do not
imitate her! It is due to every honest man that we should speak of him
as we have found him–but much more is it due to our faithful God! He
has comforted, He is comforting and He wilcomfort. And Paul puts it in
such a way as to make us feel that He will never leave off comforting
us even for a single moment1 'Who comforts us in all our
tribulation"–not in some of it, but in allof it! Our tribulations
sometimes change and a new cross is generally a very heavy one. The old
crosses get, at last, to fit the back and we can carry them better than
we could at the first–but a new cross galls the shoulders that have
not yet grown used to it. But the Lord your God will help you in your
new tribulations as well as in your old ones! And if they come thick
and threefold–tribulation upon tribulation, trouble upon
trouble–still, as your days, so shall your strength be, and He who has
comforted and is comforting, will continue to comfort you even to the
last!
IV. Now I must close with just a few remarks upon THE COMFORTING DESIGN
of which our text speaks.
Why does God lay trouble upon His people and comfort them in it? It is
that He may make them comforters of oth-ers–"that we may be able to
comfort them which are in any trouble." A man who has never had any
trouble is very awkward when he tries to comfort troubled hearts.
Hence, the minister of Christ, if he is to be of much use in God's
service, must have great trouble. "Prayer, meditation, and affliction,"
says Melanchthon, "are the three things that make the minister of God."
There must be prayer. There must be meditation and there must be
affliction. You cannot pronounce the promise correctly in the ears of
the afflicted unless you, yourself, have known its preciousness in your
own hour of trial. It is God's will that the Holy Spirit, the
Comforter, should often work by men according to that ancient word of
His, "Comfort you, comfort you My people, says your God. Speak you
comfortably to Jerusalem." These comforting men are to be made–they
are not born so–and they have to be made by passing through the
furnace, themselves. They cannot comfort others unless they have had
trouble and have been comforted in it.
More than this, the intent of God is to make us able comforters–"that
we may be able to comfort them which are in any trouble." Some have the
will to comfort the troubled, but they have not the power to do it.
"Miserable comforters are you all," said Job to his friends! And the
same has been said to many of those who have really tried to comfort
the sorrowing, but who, in the process, have put their fingers into the
open wounds and so made them worse instead of better. Brethren, the
able comforter must be a man who knows both the trial and the promise
that is suited to meet it.
Beside that, we are to be ready comforters, for we are "to comfort them
which are in any trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are
comforted of God." Experimental knowledge helps a man to speak with
power to the afflicted soul. He who has taken a certain medicine and
proved the benefit of it, is the man to recommend it to another.
Hence, the Lord often passes His ministers through trials which they
would never have to endure if it were not for their people. Even as
upon the Chief Shepherd, all the wanderings of the flock had to be
laid, so, in a very minor sense, the wanderings of the flock must be
borne by the under-shepherd, or else he cannot be a comforter to them.
Dear Friends, the next time you get into any trouble, I would recommend
you to take notes of it and to ask yourself, when it is over, "How did
God comfort me?" Lay that cordial up in store, because, one of these
days, you will need that comfort, again, or, if not, you will meet with
somebody who is in just the same fix as you were in–and you will be
able to say, "I know what will help you, for I have it down in black
and white at home, how God helped me in a trouble exactly like yours."
As I was reading a book, this afternoon, this sentence struck
me–"whenever you come into the mouth of the furnace, say to yourself,
'God has some great work for me to do and He is preparing me for it.'"
I thought to myself, "I have not often said that in the time of trial.
My thoughts have been too much taken up with the furnace to think of
the good which was to result from the fire." But I am sure that what
that writer said is true–God means to do something more by us, which,
speaking after the manner of men, He cannot yet do by us. We are not
qualified for it. But He is going to put us through a still hotter
furnace–the heat is to be more intense than any we have yet borne–and
when we come out, we shall be more fit for the Master's use!
Welcome your trials, then, Beloved! Open wide your doors and say to
tribulations, "Come in, come in! This is the place where you are to
lodge, for my Master said, 'In the world you shall have tribulation.'"
Welcome even that black trouble that has a mask on its face–it is no
adversary coming to kill you–when the mask is taken off, you will see
that, underneath it there is a bright smiling face! Some of us can say
to affliction, "Come in and welcome, for the costliest jewels we ever
possessed were brought by you! You have done us more good than all our
joys put together." We would have had no harvest if God had left us
like the hard road outside the field. But the soil has been cut up by
the sharp plow and often our very soul has been grievously tried as the
harrow and the cultivator have gone over us, again and again! But all
these processes have caused us to bring forth fruit to the praise and
glory of God! Therefore, I say again, welcome your troubles! Do not be
sorry if they travel with you for a while, for they are good guests.
Many a time, by entertaining trouble, we have "entertained angels
unawares." God bless you, Brothers and Sisters, by making you a comfort
to others! And probably it will be through the very trials which
greatly vex you!
Now to close, there may be some poor soul here broken down under a
sense of sin, some seeker who cannot find the Savior. He may speak to
some of you who were brought to Christ without any strong emotion. He
will begin telling you about his despair and you will look at him and
say, "Dear me, where has this man come from?" Then do not try to help
him, for you cannot–you have not had the experience through which he
is passing. Go find the Brother who had a hard time of it in getting to
the Wicket Gate, that poor fellow who tumbled into the Slough of
Despond with his big burden on his back and nearly got choked in the
mire. Say to him, "Brother Christian, here is another soul floundering
about just as you were." Hand him over to such a person because he will
be the most likely to help him. Any of you who had great difficulty in
laying hold of Christ at the first ought to be on the watch to find
others who are as you were–stretch out the helping hand to them and
say, "We would not have you suffer as we did if we can help it. We wish
to show you the way to Jesus Christ and to get you to see it more
quickly that we did. We even hope that you will, this very night, find
joy and peace in believing."
Do look after the broken-hearted ones, dear Friends! Watch for Mr.
Feeble-Mind. Be on the look-out for poor Mr. Fearing, do not let them
lie outside long. Help them over the wall and, as you have found mercy,
administer it, in the name of God, to all who are longing to find it!
May God bless you all, for Christ's sake! Amen.
EXPOSITION BY C. H. SPURGEON: 2 CORINTHIANS 1:1-20.
Verse 1. Paul, an Apostle of Jesus Christ by the will of God. Paul is
very careful to remind the Corinthians of that fact, since some of them
had gone the length of denying his Apostleship altogether.
1. And Timothy our brother Whom, in all humility, he associates with
himself, although he was a younger man, of far less consequence. But
Paul loved him very much and, therefore, he put his name at the
beginning of this Epistle side by side with his own–"and Timothy our
brother."
I, 2. Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, with all the saints
which are in all Achaia: Grace be to you and peace from God our Father,
and from the Lord Jesus Christ. Christianity is a religion of
benedictions! Whereas worldly people often use the language of courtesy
towards one another without meaning what they say, the saints of God
put a fullness of meaning into their expressions and really wish every
good thing to those to whom they write. "Grace be to you." That comes
first, and then peace follows. Peace without Grace is a very dangerous
possession. But a peace that grows out of the possession of Grace is a
gracious peace and will lead to the peace of Heaven before long. This
Grace and peace are to come "from God our Father, and from the Lord
Jesus Christ." There is no Grace for us apart from the Lord Jesus
Christ. And though the Father is full of love and will give Grace and
peace to His people, yet the Lord Jesus Christ must always be the
channel through which these incomparable favors must flow to them!
3, 4. Blessed be God, even the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the
Father of mercies, and the God of all comfort; who comforts us in all
our tribulation, that we may be able to comfort them which are in any
trouble, by the comfort wherewith we ourselves are comforted of God.
Nothing less, then, shall be given to the tried people of God than that
same comfort which was enjoyed by the Apostle Paul! It shall be shared
by all who are resting where Paul rested.
5. For as the sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation
also abounds by Christ. The Apostles were the most tried, but they were
the most comforted. They had to stand the brunt of the battle, but the
Lord was their strength in a very special sense. Observe the balance in
this verse–"as the sufferings," "so our consolation." And "as the
sufferings of Christ abound in us, so our consolation also abounds by
Christ." With little trial, we may expect little comfort. It is better
to leave the whole matter entirely with God, or else we might almost
desire to be dug about by the spade of affliction, that we might
receive more of the living waters of consolation!
6. And whether we are afflicted, it is for your consolation and
salvation which is effectual in the enduring of the same sufferings
which we also suffer: or whether we are comforted, it is for your
consolation and salvation. That is the grand objective of Christians,
to live for others! When God has helped us to receive both our comforts
and our sorrows as matters of trust that we are to take care of for the
benefit of our fellow Christians, then have we learned the lesson which
Christ would teach us by them!
7. And our hope of you is steadfast, knowing that as you are partakers
of the sufferings, so shall you also be of the consolation. How these
things are put together! God does not call His people to the one
without the other–no consolation without affliction and, blessed be
His name, no affliction without consolation!
8. For we would not, brethren, have you ignorant of our trouble which
came to us in Asia, that we were pressed out of measure, above
strength, insomuch that we despaired even of life. Why would Paul have
them know this but that they might understand that he had to suffer as
they did, and even more? Sometimes God's people are apt to think that
their ministers are not cast down as they are. They look upon them as a
sort of superior order of beings who have no doubts and fears, no lack
of strength, no despair. But that is an idle fiction and the sooner it
is gone from our minds, the better! For those who lead the people of
God will rather have more afflictions than less. Seeing that they need
more instruction than others need, and that instruction usually comes
with the rod–in all probability they will have more of the rod than
others will. Paul, therefore, is anxious that the Corinthians should
know in what seas of trouble he had to swim.
9. 10. But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should
not trust in ourselves, but in God which raises the dead: who delivered
us from so great a death, and does deliver: in whom we trust that He
will yet deliver us. It is supposed by some that the Apostle was in
danger of being put to death in same extraordinary way–perhaps by wild
beasts in the amphitheatre. We know that he speaks of having fought
with beasts at Ephesus. We cannot tell whether there is any allusion,
here, to that trial, or what it was. But it was evidently some death
which, to the Apostle, seemed to be exceedingly terrible. And when he
was delivered from it, it was to him like a resurrection! He speaks of
it as having been worked by God that raises the dead. And he puts down
this deliverance, together with some other of which he was at that very
time the subject–"and does deliver"–and upon these experiences he
builds his expectation that God "will yet deliver."
II. You also helping together by prayer for us, that for the gift
bestowed upon us by the means of many persons thanks may be given by
many on our behalf When many pray, after the blessings is received,
many will give thanks. Paul rejoices to have been the object of
interest to a large number of Christians everywhere in the time of his
great peril. And when he escaped, he believed be would still be the
object of their interest and that there would be more prayer in the
world, and more praise, too, because of the dangers from which God had
delivered him. It is worth while for any of us to be in sore sickness,
or in great straits, if, thereby, the quantity of prayer and praise in
the world shall be increased to God's Glory!
12. For our rejoicing is this, the testimony of our conscience, that in
simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom, but by the
Grace of God, we have had our conversation in the world, andmore
abundantly to you. For to them he had been specially particular, that
in no point they should speak of him as having used the wisdom of
words. Among them he determined not to know anything except Jesus
Christ and Him crucified. To them he was like the nurse who administers
milk to babes.
13. 14. For we write none other things unto you, than what you read or
acknowledge; and I trust you shall acknowledge even to the end; as also
you have acknowledged us in part Some of them disputed his Apostleship,
but most of them did not–
14. That we are your rejoicing, even as you, also, are ours in the day
of the Lord Jesus. What a happy condition of things it is when the
teacher and the taught mutually rejoice in each other! When the teacher
is the joy of the flock and when he can rejoice in his people! This is
profitable to all, but when there are discards, and fault-finding and
the like, this is neither glorifying to God nor profitable to the
people.
15-17. And in this confidence I was minded to come unto you before,
that you might have a second benefit; and to pass by you into
Macedonia, and to come again out of Macedonia unto you, and of you to
be brought on my way toward Judea. When I therefore was thus minded,
did I use lightness? Or the things that I purpose, do I purpose
according to the flesh, that with me there should be yes, yes, and no,
no? There were some in the Church at Corinth who said, "He promised to
come and see us, but he did not keep his word." They declared that his
promise could not be depended upon and that he very easily changed his
mind. Now the Apostle had done nothing of the kind! He had solid
reasons for his change of purpose and reasons full of love to them–but
they misrepresented him. Do not, my dear Friends, count the fiery trial
of misrepresentation to be any strange thing! Even some of those whom
you have loved and for whom you have been willing to lay down your
lives will turn against you! It is no new thing that they should do so.
They may take anything which you have done in the simplicity of your
heart and turn it against you. Whenever they do so, I say again, do not
think that any strange thing has happened to you–it happened to
Paul–then why should not you have a similar experience?
18-20. But as God is true, our word toward you was not yes and no. For
the Son of God, Jesus Christ, who was preached among you by us, even by
me andSilvanus and Timothy, was not yes and no, but in Him was yes. For
all the promises of God in Him are yes, and in Him, Amen, unto the
glory of God by us. Paul loved to turn from some lower subject to his
Lord. When he wrote the words, "yes and no," they suggested to him the
perfect constancy of the love of Christ and thankfulness for His
faithful promises. So, as the thought came into his mind, he could do
no other than put it into the Epistle he was writing, for he never
missed an opportunity of praising the Lord Jesus Christ! I wish we
could all imitate him, in this respect, far more than we have ever
done, for, our Savior is worthy of all the praise we can ever give
Him–and more, too!