my desire is before thee and my groaning is not hid from thee Vers 15. And in thee do I hope for thou wilt hear O Lord my God Nay should the same God bring him so low that he might truly say The sorrows of death compass me about and the pains of hell get hold upon me However he would have cause to say still with the same David Psal 1.2,3 I will love the Lord my strength and I will call upon the Lord who though he hath humbled me to the very dust of death yet is he still worthy to be praised And herein will appear how worthy God is of praise even when he does afflict his servant in this sad manner and therefore how just cause such an one hath even then to rejoice in the God that smites him Because as the same David tells us Psal 23.4 Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death I will fear none evil for thou art with me thy rod and thy staff comfort me 'T is the consideration and assurance of Gods presence with them in their affliction that bears up their hearts and comforts the souls of Gods servants in the most dismal calamity enabling them to rejoice in the worst of tribulations And yet 't is not bare being with them but the love and kindness he discovers to them that makes them thus satisfied and joyful He makes his very rod comfort them as well as his staff Ordinary rods indeed are dry insipid things fit for nothing but to give blows and create a smart but Gods rod hath a Prerogative beyond all others in that like Aaron's Rod Numb 17.8 laid up by Gods appointment in the Ark it blooms blossoms such as by their sweetness refresh the spirits and yields almonds a fruit that delights and comforts the Soul Nay when the strokes of his rod seem most to weaken and strike them to the ground then does God put his staff into their hands and that bears them up and keeps them from falling and therefore both together can't chuse but afford an inexpressible comfort to those good souls that are exercis'd thereby And 't is for the continual supply of this comfort and the frequent refreshment of this cordial that a devout soul is rais'd to such a degree of satisfaction and exultation amidst the very agonies of death as enables her in that dire conflict triumphantly to cry out in the language of afflicted Job Chap. 3.15,16 Though he slay me yet will I trust in him He also shall be my Salvation And 't is the same overflowing comfort that God vouchsafes a good Christian that bears up his heart and lifts up his head above all the disgraces and calumnies that the unjust ungrateful world throws upon him He knows a blessing goes along with him when men revile him and persecute him and say all manner of evil against him falsely upon account of his constant adhering to Christ and his Gospel And 't is the assurance of this that enables him to rejoice and be exceeding glad answerable to our Saviours encouragement in that particular affliction Math. 8.11,12 Nay 't is the same merciful God that supplys them with an exuberant joy in recompence for all the unkindness they meet with at the hands of cruel relations and unfaithful friends David indeed acquaints us Ps 27.13 That he had certainly fainted but that he believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living And herein God exprest his goodness to him that when his father and his mother forsook him the Lord took him up Vers 10. And 't was his receiving this seasonable comfortable mercy that made him resolutely wait on the Lord and be of good courage knowing that he did and would strengthen his heart Vers 14. Nay further when he was brought to that sad condition that his own familiar friend in whom he trusted who also eat of his bread had lift up his heel against him an affliction that of all others seems to go nearest to his heart and which he was least able to bear For if it had been an enemy that reproached him then he could have born it by whom he implies the perfidiousness of a friend to be almost insupportable Ps 55.12 And yet even in the worst of miseries was he not destitute of a satisfactory comfort Thou O Lord says he upholdest me in my integrity and settest me before thy face for ever And for this reason says he Psal 41.9,12,13 blessed be the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting Amen and Amen We have the clearest instance of what was but now delivered in the person and practise of holy Job a man afflicted beyond compare and yet satisfied and joyful beyond all example Let us but observe how of the richest man of the East he was in a few hours reduced to be one of the poorest persons upon earth His servants we find slain and his cattel carried away by the hands of thieves and murderers his sheep and his shepherds were consumed by fire from heaven his sons and his daughters kill'd by the fall of the house blown down upon their heads And yet all the discontent that Job expresses at these sad tidings was only his worshipping and praising God so says the Text Job 1.20,21,22 Then Job arose and rent his mantle and shaved his head and fell down upon the ground and worshipped and said Naked came I out of my mothers womb and naked shall I return thither The Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away blessed be the name of the Lord. Nay when God allowed the Devil to execute so much of his malice upon him as to smite his body with sore boils from the soal of his foot to his crown whereby we may easily guess that the noisomeness and the pain made his life a burden to himself and his friends and when the wife of his bosom had perswaded him to end his days with Blasphemy against God at once as 't were to defie and revenge himself upon the Author of his Misery He was so far from doing so that rebuking her for her wicked advice Thou speakest says he Job 2.9,10 as one of the foolish women speaketh He there acquaints her with his contentment and satisfaction in his present povertous painful condition What shall we receive good at the hand of God says he and shall we not receive evil 'T is unreasonable we should covet the one and not accept the other when they both come from the same gracious hand Nay when his three friends had made an appointment together to come to mourn with him and comfort him as we are told Job 2.11 and yet instead of doing so made it their great business to reproach him and accuse him as some notorious sinner or vile Hypocrite for so says Eliphaz in the name of the rest Chap. 47. Remember I pray thee whoever perished being innocent or