SERMON X.

GOD A REFUGE AND HELP.*

PSALM 46: 1.-God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble.

MAN is always dependent and therefore always wants help and strength. But he especially wants these in a time of trouble. A time of trouble is often, if not always a time of danger; and in danger we want a refuge, a place to which we may flee and be safe. Even in prosperity we are dependent, and want help, strength and refuge; but at such a time we are not apt to be so sensible of our wants. In trouble a sense of them is wont to be lively and strong, and to carry full conviction to the mind. Now our text informs us where we may obtain that strength and help, and where we may find that refuge, which is so necessary in trouble. "God is our refuge and strength, a very present help in trouble."

As our text plainly implies, that we are liable to trouble, therefore I shall

I. Mention some of the troubles to which we are most liable. II. Consider in what respects God is our refuge and strength. III. Show that he is a very present help in trouble.

I. I am to mention some of the troubles to which mankind are most liable.

These are of several kinds.

1. We are liable to personal troubles, such as pain, sickness and death. "By one man sin entered into the world, and death by sin, and so death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." And with death came all that train of evils which attend it and lead to it. We are liable to disappointments in our expectations; to disappointments in business; to losses of property; and to poverty with all its attendant evils. There is no dependence on any possessions in life. The most affluent often lose their property, and are reduced to the greatest want. We are

* Preached at the funeral of the Hon. Roger Sherman, senator of the United States of America, who died the 23d of July, 1793. Published at New Haven.

liable to the loss of our reputation, and this not only in consequence of ill conduct, but by the mere malice of others. Even the holy apostles and primitive christians could not be safe from the reproaches of their enemies. 1 Cor. 4: 12, 13, "Being reviled, we bless; being persecuted, we suffer it; being defamed, we entreat; we are made as the filth of the world, and are the offscouring of all things unto this day."

2. We are liable to bereavement of our friends and relatives. Our happiness in this world often very much depends on them. When they are taken away, we of course lose all that happiness which we derived from them. Besides, the loss of them is generally attended with a positive affliction which is peculiar and pungent. To separate some of the nearest connections of life is like separating soul and body, or tearing man from himself. Yet there is no discharge in this war.

3. We are liable to public calamities, such as drought, famine, wars, internal broils and commotions. Some of those calamities are severely felt at this very time, by several of the nations of the world. But happy are we that we are free from them. Another public calamity to which we and all men are liable, is the loss of wise and faithful magistrates. And this is a very great calamity. A faithful man, who can find? When we have found him and found him in the office of a principal magistrate, we ought highly to prize him, and when he is taken from us, to consider it as a great frown of divine providence.

4. We are liable to spiritual troubles, as well as temporal. As sinners, we are already the subjects of that which is the source of all other evils. And in consequence of sin and depravity in general we are liable to various temptations, temptations from our own corruptions, temptations from the world and from our grand adversary. We are liable to spiritual desertions, to the hiding of the light of God's countenance, to the just withholding of such measures of divine grace as we need for our christian comfort and edification; nay, to the accusations of a guilty conscience, to fear of divine wrath, to spiritual darkness and even to despondency. Also we are liable to trouble which respects the church of God in general. Is there a general opposition to the cause of Christ? a general persecution? or a perversion or rejection of his truth more or less general? These must affect every christian, and be a sore trial to him. In proportion as the cause of christianity is promoted and prospers, every real christian is happy; in proportion as it is opposed and obstructed, it is a trouble and an affliction to him.

These are some of the kinds of trouble both temporal and spi

ritual, to which we are most liable. In these we need a refuge, we need strength and help; and our text directs us where we may find them. Therefore I am,

II. To consider in what respect God is our refuge and strength.

A refuge is a shelter from any danger or distress. A person exposed to an enemy may flee to a fortress. In this case the fortress is his refuge. Exposed to a storm he may flee to his house, and then he makes his house a refuge. Now God is a refuge or a defence to all who will flee to him, whatever their danger, distress or trouble be. He is their strength too. Those who are weak, need strength; those who are exposed, need a refuge. But we are both weak and exposed. As creatures we are weak originally and necessarily; and are rendered much more weak by sin and depravity. Also we are exposed to innumerable foes, and to be overwhelmed by innumerable evils. Therefore we need a refuge. But God offers himself to us both as our strength and refuge. In all our troubles and dangers we may safely apply to him, and if we apply sincerely, we shall find refuge and strength. He will protect us from all the evil which is not for our good, and will overrule that for our good, which he permits to come upon us. He will strengthen us by his grace immediately communicated. Thus he strengthened Paul under his trials, and assured him that his grace was sufficient for him; and through Christ strengthening him he could do all things.

Beside the immediate influence of the divine grace and spirit, God is also wont to strengthen by his truth.

Here it may be proper to inquire, what considerations or views of God and divine truth have a happy tendency to support and strengthen christians under the trials of life.

1. The consideration that God reigns universally, and that he orders all their afflictions, happily tends to support and strengthen them. His kingdom ruleth over all and his disposal extendeth to all events whatsoever; not only to those which we acknowledge to be important, such as the rise and fall of kingdoms and empires, etc.; but to those which we are apt to think are most unimportant and trifling. For the former depend on the latter. The selling of Joseph into Egypt, the consequent preservation of the family of Jacob and the fulfilment of God's covenant with Abraham, all depended on the seemingly trifling occurrences of a boy's dream, and of his father's making for him a coat of divers colors. And even the crucifixion of our Lord and the redemption of mankind depended on the giving of a sop to one of the disciples. Therefore there is no foundation, for the infidel objec

tion to a universal providence, that some events are too small and trifling to be the objects of divine attention. The scriptures assure us, that though two sparrows are of such small value as to be sold for a farthing, yet not one of them falleth to the ground without our heavenly Father; and that the very hairs of our heads are all numbered by him.

Some readily grant a universal divine disposal as to natural events, but deny it with respect to the free actions of moral agents, as they imagine such a disposal to be inconsistent with the freedom of those actions. If the freedom of those actions consist in contingence, or in the circumstance that they are not caused by any thing external to the mind; undoubtedly a disposal of providence extending to those actions would be inconsistent with their freedom. But if the freedom of those actions consist in their voluntariness, and if a man be free to anything with respect to which he is not under either a compulsion or restraint to which his will on the whole is opposed, or may be supposed to be opposed; then there is not the least inconsistence between human liberty and a universal and overruling agency of God in all events what

soever.

As God is perfect, all his works must be perfect, and his providence is directed by perfect wisdom and goodness. Therefore all that he does, or permits to take place, is, considered as a dispensation of providence, perfectly wise, just and good. The Judge of all the earth will and must do right. He cannot err. This under the greatest afflictions is a most strengthening and supporting consideration.

2. The consideration that God requires submission and patience under all afflictions is of the same happy tendency. As was observed under the preceding particular, the Judge of all the earth cannot do otherwise than right; therefore he requires nothing which is not right and reasonable. This requirement is not only authoritative and in that view must be complied with; but we ought to comply with it, in consideration of the reasonableness and fitness of it; so that in instances of affliction which are the most dark and mysterious, we may implicitly believe that submission and acquiescence are no more than our reasonable service, since God requires them. This consideration tends to strengthen against impatience and murmuring, and against fainting in the day of adversity.

3. That all our afflictions will subserve the divine glory and the general good of the created system, is also supporting and strengthening to every pious and benevolent mind. The declarative glory of God and the good of the created system mutually

imply each other and are one and the same thing. When good is promoted in the creation, God is glorified; and when God is glorified, good is promoted in the creation. But the greatest good of the created system no more implies the happiness of every individual, than the greatest good of the state implies the happiness of every citizen.

And as it was the original design of God to glorify himself and to promote the happiness of the creation, to the highest possible degree; so he hath chosen a plan or system of the universe, of all others in the best possible manner adapted to these ends. To imagine the contrary, would be an impeachment of his goodness, and would imply that he was, by some principle opposed to goodness, kept back from communicating that good, which he could easily have communicated.

I know it has been objected, that on the supposition, that God has adopted the best possible system of the universe, he hath exhausted his own infinite goodness; which it is said, is an absurdity, because infinite goodness is by the terms inexhaustible. But is infinite goodness any more inexhaustible, than any attribute of God? All his attributes are equally infinite, as his goodness; for instance his truth or his wisdom. Yet it will not be denied, that he exhausts his truth in all his communications with his creatures, and speaks as truly as it is possible for him to speak; or that he exhausts his wisdom in all his conduct, and acts as wisely as it is possible he should act. Therefore there is no absurdity in supposing, that God acted as wisely as it is possible he should act, in choosing this particular system of the universe, and that he exhausted his infinite wisdom in this, as well as in every other instance of his conduct. But how could he have acted in the wisest possible manner if he did not choose the best possible system? Does wisdom ever dictate anything inconsistent with goodness? or are infinite wisdom and infinite goodness opposed to each other?

If the system which God hath in fact adopted be the wisest and best possible, doubtless every part and every event in this system is in the best manner calculated to subserve the ends of infinite wisdom and goodness. Not that all things and events have this tendency in their own nature. No, many of them have a diametrically opposite tendency. Still under the overruling hand of God they are made to subserve the best purposes.

This then is one great comfort which the christian has under all his afflictions. Though he suffers, he suffers not in vain. His sufferings answer most important and benevolent purposes. God is thereby glorified and the happiness of the creation is proVOL. II.

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