The Working of All Things Together for Good 2
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1. "All things!" Look at that! All that concerns our body and soul; everything in providence, everything in grace; everything you have passed through, everything you are passing through, everything you shall pass through. Let each of you who love God, and fear his name in this congregation, take everything belonging to you, and lay it upon this text, as you might lay hymn-books and Bibles on the table before me. There is not a single thing in providence or grace that concerns any person in this congregation who loves God, that the promise cannot bear.
"All things! all things!" What! is there not a single thing, however minute, however comparatively unimportant, that is not for my good if I love God? No, not one. If there were a single thing, this text would not be true; God would speak an untruth. If there were a single thing which befalls me, be it in providence, or be it in grace, that is not working together for my good, if I am a child of God, I say it with reverence, that this would be a lie in God's book. And yet, when we consider the variety of things that affect us--to believe that all of them are working together for our good, how must we admire the wonderful wisdom, and power, and government of God.
But let us, by the way of casting a clearer light upon the words, "all things," look at them more minutely. All things that take place are either according to God's decretive appointment, or according to his permissive appointment. Many things that try your mind, and exercise your souls, are according to God's decretive appointment. Everything with which sin or Satan are not intermingled, we may say, comes from God's decretive appointment; and if we are lovers of God, they are working together for our good. Are we tried in our circumstances? This is according to God's decretive appointment. Is it the Lord's will and pleasure to bring us down in the world, by sorrows and adversities in providence? This is still according to God's decretive appointment. Have we afflictions in the family? It is still according to God's decretive appointment. It comes from him. Nothing can happen in body, in property, in family, that does not spring from God's decretive appointment. Are children taken away? They are taken by the hand of God. "The Lord gives, and the Lord takes away." Is wife or husband afflicted? The hand of God is in it. Is the body brought down with sickness? It comes from God. Is the mind tried with a thousand perplexities, anxieties, and cares? It is still the hand of God. All these matters spring from his decretive appointment!
But is Satan permitted to harass and distress our minds? This is only by God's permissive appointment. He could do nothing against Job until God gave him permission. Have we enemies in the church or in the world? Have we to endure persecution for Christ's sake? slander, calumny, and opposition? Shimei was permitted to curse David; and Jeroboam was raised up in consequence of the idolatry of Solomon. All is still according to God's permissive appointment. Are we tried by the evils of our fallen nature? It is still according to God's permissive appointment; for nothing can take place, either in providence or in grace, except as God in his infinite wisdom has decreed to perform, or decreed to allow.
2. But all these things, however trying to our minds, however hard to bear, however painful to our flesh, are decreed to "work together". They do not work singly, but they work together with something else. It is like my watch. The wheel that turns the hand is not the same wheel that is moved by the spring; but one wheel works within another wheel, and one cog catches in another cog, until at length, the time of day is shown upon the dial. So with respect to our afflictions, our exercises, the trials of our minds, the various disappointments and perplexities we have to endure; they do not work singly, but together with something else; and it is by this working together with something else that they produce a divine and blessed result.
But what is that with which they work? The grace of God in the soul. The wheel of providence works with the wheel of grace; and the wheel of grace works with the wheel of providence; and together a blessing is the result. For instance. Some affliction befalls your body; you are laid upon a sick bed. That affliction will do you no good in itself; but it works together with the grace of God in your soul; and by its working together with the grace of God in your soul, a blessing is the result. Or, you are brought down in circumstances – you have a very difficult path to tread in providence. This will do you no good in itself; there are thousands of people in bad circumstances who get no good from them. But it works together with the life and power of God in your soul; and so it produces a blessing. Or, you may lose a wife, or a child, or have sickness in your family; in themselves no good is produced by these things; but they work together with the life and power of God in your soul; and this brings about the blessing. In this word lies the mystery--they worktogether.
3. But what do they work together for? "For good." But what do we call good? We must not take our idea of good, but God's idea of the matter. We must not take what we fancy to be good, but what is really and truly so in his eyes. For instance. A man may say, it is very good to have health; it may be so in his eyes, but not so in God's. Another may say, it is a very good thing to get on in the world, to have a flourishing business, and prosperous trade; that may be good in his eyes, but not in God's. Another may say, it is good for me to have a family growing up in health and strength, and well provided for – it may be so in his eyes; but it does not follow that it is good in the Lord's. Another may say, it is good to have no troubles, no temptations, no wicked heart, no devil to beguile or harass; it may seem very good in his eyes, but it does not follow that it is so in God's eyes. He is judge in these matters.
What, then, are we to say is "good?" Whatever produces spiritual profit and a blessing; that which is really good in the eyes of a heart-searching God.
Now just see whether all these things do not in this sense work together for good to those who love God, and are the called according to his purpose. You have had an afflicted body. Well, that in itself did you no good; for it incapacitated you for business, troubled your mind, made you a burden to yourself and a burden to all around you. There was no good in that. But suppose it weaned you from the world; suppose it set death before your eyes, made you die daily, stirred up a spirit of prayer and supplication in your heart; suppose it opened up those promises of God which are suitable to his afflicted family; suppose it was the means of blessing your soul with some sweet manifestation of your saving interest in the love and blood of the Lamb--are you then to say, that your sickness, your affliction has not been for good, when it worked together with the grace of God in your soul to bring forth a real blessing?
Or, you have had reverses in the world, have lost money in trade, and are now in distressed circumstances. There is no good in these things considered abstractly; but do they stir up the life and power of God in your soul? do they give you an errand to the throne of grace? do they show you what is in your heart? do they call forth confession before God? do they make Jesus near and dear to your souls? do they wean you from the world? Then they have worked together for your good.
You have lost a child, or have an afflicted wife, and unhealthy family; there is no good in that; for "the sorrow of the world works death." But suppose that this wife or child has become your idol; that you have worshiped it instead of worshiping God – why, then, this affliction works together for good, if through it your heart's affections are now fixed on the Lord Jesus alone.
Thus we are to measure this good, not by what the creature thinks, but by what God himself has declared to be good in his word, and what we have felt to be good in our soul's experience. Have your trials humbled you, made you meek and lowly? They have done you good. Have they stirred up a spirit of prayer in your bosom, made you sigh, cry, and groan for the Lord to appear, visit, or bless your soul? They have done you good. Have they opened up those parts of God's word which are full of mercy and comfort to his afflicted people? They have done you good. Have they stripped off the covering that is too narrow? They have done you good. Have they made you more sincere, more earnest, more spiritual, more heavenly-minded, more convinced that the Lord Jesus can alone bless and comfort your soul? They have done you good. Have they been the means in God's hand of giving you a lift in hearing the preached word, of opening your ears to hear none but the true servants of God, those who enter into a tried path, and describe a gracious experience? They have done you good. Have they made the Bible more precious to you, the promises more sweet, the dealings of God with your soul more prized? They have done you good.
Now this is the way, that "all things work together for good." Not by puffing you up with pride, but by filling your heart with humility; not by encouraging presumption, but by raising your affections to where Jesus sits at the right hand of God; not by carrying us into the world, but by bringing us out of it; not by covering us with a veil of ignorance and arrogance, but by stripping this veil off, and bringing light, life, and power into the soul. In this way, "all things work together for good to those who love God, and are the called according to his purpose."
III. The knowledge of the promise, and of our personal interest in it. "We know that all things work together for good." How do we know it? We know it in two ways. We know it, first, from the testimony of God's word – and we know it secondly, from the testimony of God in our own conscience.
1. Let us look at the record of God's word. See the saints of old; how afflicted they were! But did not all things work together for good to them? Look at Jacob! What sorrows, trials and afflictions the aged patriarch went through! his whole life one continued scene of trouble and sorrow. But did not all work together for his good? Was there one too many, or one too heavy? Could he not in the end lay his head upon his dying pillow, and bless and thank God for them all?
Look at Joseph! Did not all things work together for his good? His brethren's enmity; his being sold into Egypt; the wicked conduct of his master's wife – his being cast into prison – his interpreting the chief butler's and baker's dreams. How all these things worked together for his good, and brought him out to occupy the next place to Pharaoh himself, and be the means in the hand of God of keeping alive the people of Israel.
Look at David! Hunted on the mountains like a partridge; continually exposed to the spear of Saul; on every hand nothing but persecution and distress – on all sides affliction and sorrow. Yet all things worked together for his good. What blessed Psalms we have in consequence! What a sweet treasury of comfort for God's people through David being thus hunted about on the mountains and in the wilderness! How suitable they are to God's poor tried and tempted family! If David had not had all these persecutions and afflictions, he never could have written the Psalms, nor would there have been in them such treasures of consolation.
Look at Job's troubles and afflictions! Children taken away; property swept off in a moment; his body plagued with boils; his friends turned to enemies; and God himself appearing to be against him. Yet, how all things worked together for good in his case!
2. We know it from the testimony of God in our own conscience. And have we not in our measure proved the same? When trials came, we could not see that they were working together for good. No – perhaps you have sometimes been, as I have felt, in such a state as to believe we never would see the day when they would prove for our good. They were so dark in themselves, so mysterious, so painful, so trying, so perplexing, that in the unbelief of our mind, we could scarcely believe that God himself could ever convince us they were working together for our spiritual good.
But has there been any trial, any temptation, any exercise, any affliction, any sorrow, which has not in some way or other worked together for our spiritual good--in humbling us, showing us more of what we are, opening up the Scriptures to us, stirring up a spirit of prayer, making Jesus precious, throwing light upon God's truth, or applying that truth with a measure of sweetness and comfort to our souls? Thus, we know from our own experience as well as Scripture, that "all things work together for good to those who love God, and are the called according to his purpose."
But, you may say, 'I do not see it now.' No; there is the trying point. 'I do not feel it at this present moment.' No! Did you see your past trials at the very moment--that they were working together for your good? When the Lord afflicted your body, brought you down in circumstances, sent disease into your family, allowed your mind to be tried with the fiery darts of the devil, and a thousand temptations and perplexities--I want to know whether at the time you could speak confidently, 'I know that what I am now passing through will work together for my spiritual good.' If you could say that, then I will add this--it was not half a trial. If you are passing through any trial, sorrow, or temptation; and can look up unto God, and say, 'I know and am persuaded that this very thing is working together for my spiritual good--if you can say that, you have got through more than half the trial. It is this which aggravates the trials, temptations, and exercises of God's people for the most part--that when they are in them they have not this blessed confidence.
When we can look back and say, 'there has not been a single trial that has not worked in some measure for my good'--that experience encourages us to look forward, and to believe that present trials will have the same result--and that all things are working together for good to us as far as we love God, and are the called according to his purpose.
Thus we may resolve it all. There is no man that can say, 'I can make my trials work together for good.' He cannot manage that. He must have them; and it is a mercy to have them. It is a mercy when we are enabled to bring our trials, our exercises, our temptations to the Lord's feet, and say, 'Lord, here I am, with all my trials, troubles, exercises; I cannot manage them; they are too much for me; you must undertake for me; you must bring me off more than conqueror; you must appear for me; you must bless me; you must cause all my trials, exercises, and temptations to work together for my spiritual good; let the trial be sharp, let the affliction be heavy, let there be nothing in it but what is most painful and grievous, yet, Lord, if I can but believe that they are working together for my spiritual good, I can bear them all!'
If we have found that this has been the result of all that has passed, it may enable us at times to believe it for all that is to come, and to look up in confidence that nothing can happen to us, be it in providence or in grace – but can and will "work together for good to those who love God, and are called according to his purpose."
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