Page:On the providence of God in the government of the world.pdf/14

 fession of Christ, it maybe a great calamity in the judgment of their persecutors, but their own sense it is a state of joy and triumph. Christ tells his disciples, 'In the world ye shall have tribulation but in me ye shall have peace. Rejoice and be exceeding glad, for great is your reward in heaven. These things have I spoken that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full;' St. Paul exhorts them, 'Rejoice in the Lord always. Be careful for nothing, but in every thing by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving let your requests be made known unto God: and the peace of God which passeth all understanding, shall keep your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus. Rejoice evermore; in every thing give thanks.' He gives an account of himself when he was going to his martyrdom not like a man overpressed with grief, 'I am now ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at hand. I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the righteous judge shall give me at that day,' 2 Tim. iv. 6, 7, 8. They were imprisoned, and scourged, and banished, and killed all the day long, yet full of consolation; 'They were troubled on every side, but not distressed: perplexed, but not in despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; cast down, but not destroyed; sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; having nothing, and yet possessing all things.' They suffered all that malicious men in power could do, 'but they were strengthened with all might unto all patience and long-suffering with joyfulness.' They were thought to in great misery, by those who could look no further  the outward appearance; but all that while they had the mighty support of faith and hope, the strong  of grace and the Holy Spirit, St. Stephen's, 'Heaven opened, and Jesus on the right hand of God into whose presence, where there is fulness of joy,  should make so much the more haste, by how  the sharper their sufferings were.

On the other side, men magnify the prosperity of the rich, let them be never so bad, and 'they call the proud happy, but the account will be another thing, if the