'Voices From The Past' Vol. 1 — July 3

Times of adversity are seasonable times to trust in God. When we have no bread to eat, or water to drink, but only afflictions and astonishments, this is a time not for over-grieving, murmuring, sinking, desponding, despairing, but for trusting. In a tempest a believer must cast his anchor upward. Trust is a believer's choicest antidote against fainting, swooning, and sinking. When the hand of the Lord has greatly multiplied our sorrows; when he breaks upon us with breach upon breach; when his arrows stick fast in us, and his hand presses us sore; when we are fain to eat ashes like bread and to mingle our drink with weeping; now is a time to stir up our faith to purpose. In this tempest, faith sits at the helm and preserves the soul from shipwreck. Faith grapples with the Goliath of affliction, and overcomes it. When the heart is apt to fail, when the soul is apt to swoon, faith draws forth its bottle and administers a reviving cordial. Amidst all storms, winds, and tempests, yea, in a hurricane of sorrow and misery, faith knows where and how to cast anchor: 'Let not your hearts be troubled' (John 14:1). Faith is the antidote and healer of all diseases. It allows a believer to live in the midst of death. God has extraordinary means to bear us up when ordinary ones fail. He can turn poisons into antidotes, hindrances into furtherances, and destructions into deliverances. The ravens give Elijah food. A whale becomes Jonah's ship, and pilot too. An Almighty God can work without means. God often brings his people into such a condition that they do not know what to do. He does this that they might know what he can do. God is with his people at all times, but he is most sweetly with them in the worst of times.

Devotional Readings taken from Puritan Devotional Readings 'Voices From The Past Vol.1.'
Thomas Lye, Puritan Sermons 1659-1689, I:381-397
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