On the final morning we began with the second of Bill Hughes's messages on discouragement in the ministry.
He took us to Exodus 5, 6 and also Deuteronomy 29:29. He spoke again of discouragements and then of crucial reminders f how to deal with them.
Discouragements
Bitterly
disappointed In Exodus Moses takes it to the Lord in prayer. We often wonder why something is happening as it is and often there is no answer. Peter is released but James dies. He gave the example of the death of Hudson Taylor's
daughter. Why did she die and why at the time she did?
It is no good to pretend that such things are not a problem. He gave this quote from Conan
Doyle explaining why he became a materialist.
I was called in by a poor woman to see her daughter. As I entered the humble sitting-room there was a small cot at one side, and by the gesture of the mother I understood that the sufferer was there. I picked up a candle and walking over I stooped over the little bed, expecting to see a child. What I really saw was a pair of brown sullen eyes, full of loathing and pain, which looked up in resentment to mine. I could not tell how old the creature was. Long thin limbs were twisted and coiled in the tiny couch. The face was sane but malignant. "What is it?" I asked in dismay when we were out of hearing. "It's a girl," sobbed the mother. "She's nineteen. Oh! if God would only take her!"
He also gave the example of a woman
whose three sons were all killed on the same day in WWII. Why?
With that comes the question how long. When we look at these things it is crucial to see that they are all part
of the mysteries of the will of God. They are not, however, mysteries to him.
Example here are Abraham receiving the promise of a son but then facing silence for 25 years until the point where it was impossible.
Part of the answer is that the glory
must be God's. Remember the story of Gideon or Psalm 107 or Jesus's question to Philip Where shall we buy bread? We need to see a thing is impossible on the human level but God is all
powerful.
he also mentioned 1
Peter 1:7 and the fact God knows our breaking point (see 1 Corinthians 10:13). God
and Satan are at war in this world but it is not an equal fight.
Those who say they do not have a problem with certain temptations need to see that this is because God is protecting them from that form of
temptation.
Crucial
reminders of how to deal with them
What
can help us in the midst of such things? If
the foundations are destroyed what can the righteous do?
1. We can look up
We ought to review
the lessons from the past. Moses is reminded that this is the God of
Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
We ought to think more of the loneliness of Christ. In one place the poet Rupert
Brooke wrote
"I haven't told you much about my voyage, have I? There's not much to tell. I felt, before I got your letter, a trifle lonely at Liverpool. Everybody else seemed to have people to see them off. So I went back on shore and found a dirty little boy, who was unoccupied, and said his name was William. 'Will you wave to me if I give you sixpence, William?' I said. 'Why yes,' said William. So I gave him sixpence, and went back on board. And when the time came he leaned over his railing on the landing-stage, and waved. And now and then he shouted indistinct messages in a shrill voice. And as we slid away, the last object I looked at was a small dot waving a white handkerchief, or nearly white, faithfully. So I got my sixpenn'orth and my farewell - Dear William!"
"I haven't told you much about my voyage, have I? There's not much to tell. I felt, before I got your letter, a trifle lonely at Liverpool. Everybody else seemed to have people to see them off. So I went back on shore and found a dirty little boy, who was unoccupied, and said his name was William. 'Will you wave to me if I give you sixpence, William?' I said. 'Why yes,' said William. So I gave him sixpence, and went back on board. And when the time came he leaned over his railing on the landing-stage, and waved. And now and then he shouted indistinct messages in a shrill voice. And as we slid away, the last object I looked at was a small dot waving a white handkerchief, or nearly white, faithfully. So I got my sixpenn'orth and my farewell - Dear William!"
It is a temptation to isolate ourselves. That is just what the devil wants (avoiding
fraternals and conferences, etc).
At this point he alerted us to the helpfulness of Christian biographies. Eg The life of John G Paton, the story of Thomas
Boston.
The Bostons buried
six of their ten children. Boston wrote
On the 24th of May, about two or three o'clock in the morning, my wife, after long and sore labour, brought forth her first child, a daughter, called Katharine; having, at the holy and just pleasure of the sovereign Former of all things, a double harelip, whereby she was rendered incapable of sucking. My wife, having a great terror of the pains of child-bearing, had beforehand laid her account with death; as she always, I think, did on that occasion thereafter; having, at the same sovereign pleasure, an uncommon share of these pains, the remembrance whereof to this day makes my heart to shrink. When I, understanding her to be delivered, and preserved, was coming towards the chamber to see her; Mrs Lawson above mentioned meeting me, intimated to me the case of the child: with which my heart was struck, like a bird shot and falling from a tree. Howbeit I bore it gravely; and my afflicted wife carried the trial very Christianly and wisely, after her manner. Thus it pleased my God, to correct me for my sins; to balance my enjoyment; and to teach to acknowledge Him, in the formation of children in the womb. The child being weak, was baptised by Mr. Dawson the same day: and was for a long time watched in the night, through the summer. In that dear child's case, I had a singular experience of tender love melted down in pity; as considering her teeth set on edge through the parent's eating of the sour grape.He also related the famous story of James Fraser found in The Days of the Fathers in Ross-shire.
A cold, unfeeling, bold, unheeding, worldly woman was his wife. Never did her godly husband sit down to a comfortable meal in his own house, and often would he have fainted from sheer want of needful sustenance but for the considerate kindness of some of his parishioners. She was too insensate to try to hide her treatment of him, and well was it for him, on one account, that she was. His friends thus knew of his ill-treatment, and were moved to do what they could for his comfort. A godly acquaintance arranged with him, to leave a supply of food in a certain place, beside his usual walk, of which he might avail him self when starved at home. Even light and fire in his study were denied to him on the long, cold winter evenings ; and as his study was his only place of refuge from the cruel scourge of his wife s tongue and temper, there, shivering, and in the dark, he used to spend his winter evenings at home. Compelled to walk in order to keep himself warm, and accustomed to do so when preparing for the pulpit, he always kept his hands before him as feelers in the dark, to warn him of his approaching the wall at either side of the room. In this way he actually wore a hole through the plaster, at each end of his accustomed beat, on which some eyes have looked that glistened with light from other fire than that of love, at the remembrance of his cruel wife. But the godly husband had learned to thank the Lord for the discipline of this trial. Being once at a Presbytery dinner, alone, amidst a group of moderates, one of them proposed, as a toast, the health of their wives, and, turning to Mr Fraser, said, as he winked at his companions, " You, of course, will cordially join in drinking to this toast." " So I will, and so I ought Mr Fraser said, "for mine has been a better wife to me than any one of yours has been to you " " How so they all exclaimed" She has sent me," was his reply, " seven times a day to my knees, when I would not otherwise have gone, and that is more than any of you can say of yours."
He also mentioned Alan
Gardiner and spoke of how there is comfort just in reading their lives. What you are going through is
what is common to man.
he also reminded us that the
one who sends the storm is the one who gives comfort. So
- Review the lessons from the past
- Reflect on the experience of Christ
- Remember the character of God
