Trials Subscribe   
   From:  cajunhillbilly (Willard01)   4/15/2002 7:16 am  
To:  ALL   (1 of 1)  
 
  372.1  
 
Trials are necessary to wean us from the world. 
When we grow wanton, or worldly, or proud, how 
does sickness or some other affliction humble us. 
Perhaps nothing possesses so detaching, so 
divorcing an effect in the experience of the 
Christian as affliction. 

The world is a great snare to the child of God! 
Its rank is a snare; 
its possessions are a snare; 
its honors are a snare; 
its enterprises are a snare; 
the very duties and engagements of daily life are a 
snare to one whose heart would desire to be more 
frequently and exclusively where Jesus, its treasure is. 

Oh, how the things that are seen veil the things 
that are not seen! How do temporal things banish 
from our thought and affections and desires, the 
things that are eternal! 

God in His wisdom and mercy, sends us trials 
to detach us from earth; to lessen our worldly 
mindedness; to more deeply convince us how 
empty and insufficient are all created things. 

He chastens us to intensify our affection for spiritual 
things, and to bring our souls nearer to Himself. 

Oh, when the heart is chastened and subdued by 
sorrow, when the soul is smitten and humbled by 
adversity, when death bereaves, or sickness invades, 
or resources narrow, or calamity in one of its many 
crushing forms lands heavily upon us, how solemn, 
how earnest, how distinct is the voice of our ascended 
Redeemer, "Set your affections on things above, 
not on things of the earth. I am your Treasure, 
your Portion, your All. I have stricken, and wounded 
and laid you low; but I will comfort, heal, and raise 
you up again. You will soon be with Me in glory. 
Let this trial detach the world from you, wean you 
from your idols, and transfer your affections to Me." 
(Octavius Winslow) 

 
  
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