Spurgeon: March AM
* 03/08/AM
"We must through much tribulation enter into the kingdom of
God."
--Acts 14:22
God's people have their trials. It was never designed by God,
when He chose His people, that they should be an untried people.
They were chosen in the furnace of affliction; they were never
chosen to worldly peace and earthly joy. Freedom from sickness
and the pains of mortality was never promised them; but when
their Lord drew up the charter of privileges, He included
chastisements amongst the things to which they should inevitably
be heirs. Trials are a part of our lot; they were predestinated
for us in Christ's last legacy. So surely as the stars are
fashioned by his hands, and their orbits fixed by Him, so surely
are our trials allotted to us: He has ordained their season and
their place, their intensity and the effect they shall have upon
us. Good men must never expect to escape troubles; if they do,
they will be disappointed, for none of their predecessors have
been without them. Mark the patience of Job; remember Abraham,
for he had his trials, and by his faith under them, he became
the "Father of the faithful." Note well the biographies of all
the patriarchs, prophets, apostles, and martyrs, and you shall
discover none of those whom God made vessels of mercy, who were
not made to pass through the fire of affliction. It is ordained
of old that the cross of trouble should be engraved on every
vessel of mercy, as the royal mark whereby the King's vessels of
honour are distinguished. But although tribulation is thus the
path of God's children, they have the comfort of knowing that
their Master has traversed it before them; they have His
presence and sympathy to cheer them, His grace to support them,
and His example to teach them how to endure; and when they reach
"the kingdom," it will more than make amends for the "much
tribulation" through which they passed to enter it.