Yes; the smoking furnace and the burning lamp still pass before us, and shape our lives. How many times has God touched the hidden springs of action, and turned the current of our history! How often has he mysteriously hedged up our way, and disappointed us; made our surest calculations fail, our favorite plans miscarry! How has he led us by a way we knew not, and caused us to stand perplexed, bewildered, and alarmed at his unlooked-for interpositions! What sudden calamities have befallen us; what sore chastisements have come upon us! How many times has God’s face been hid in clouds! How often have we asked, What can his doings mean? Why does he scatter our possessions? Why is health prostrated, and we left to languish amid pains and sicknesses? Why did he let death make those little graves in the churchyard, where our darlings are sleeping, who used to fill our homes with sunshine, and paint rainbows in the clouds of life’s pilgrimage? Oh how many times are we perplexed at the Almighty’s doings! In such seasons of disappointment and affliction, we think upon God and are troubled. He passes before us in the thick gloom and darkness of the night of sorrow: about all we can see of him is a smoking furnace, with its smouldering embers, scarcely emitting from within a pale, faint, spectral gleam, while dim wreaths of clouds whirl and roll above it. God’s ways seem dark and impenetrable. Such are our first impressions.
But while we continue to gaze upon his doings, and follow out his providences to their conclusions; when, after Time with his soothing balm has assuaged the first sharp pangs of our wounded hearts, we study carefully the tendencies and results of God’s dispensations with us, Oh how often do the clouds break and scatter, and the deep mysteries of his dealings receive a new interpretation.
How many of our doubts and questions find an answer. How do future months and years vindicate the wisdom of those doings which we once thought could not be vindicated. How do we afterwards see that when God took away some blessings which we dearly loved, it was to make room for greater ones to come. When he stopped our way in some favorite pursuit of life, and beckoned us against our will in another path, he saved us from ruin and disasters which we were blind to. When he snatched our loved one away to heaven, he broke up the sinful idolatry which was ensnaring us, and called us heavenward too. When he dashed from our hand the cup of worldly prosperity we were pressing to our lips, it was because we were growing delirious under its draughts.
It is thus, while we calmly trace through successive years God’s doings, we begin to see the furnace grow luminous, and close behind it the burning lamp lights up the Almighty’s footsteps. We may not indeed comprehend the whole. We cannot clear up all the mystery that surrounds him. But though the furnace still continues to move and smoke before us, yet the lamp is ever going with it; and its cheering rays relieve the gloom, so that faith and hope can follow.
Such is the method of God’s dealings with us all. He passes before us in mingled mystery and light. The longer we trace his doings, the clearer is the light. A hasty, superficial study of his providence leaves us in painful gloom and doubt. But a patient and humble attention to his plans reveals much to relieve our fears and inspire in a Christian a steady, trusting, joyous confidence.
We must never expect to arrive at a full and undimmed prospect here. We see but in part. But ah, I think I can see something in the gradual unfoldings of God’s providence, and in the steps the believer now passes through, which heralds a coming period when we shall see the whole. Even now the shadows grow fainter the longer we gaze. A grey light streaks the field of vision which was once in total darkness. Even now, when faith turns her eye out long and steady, night seems softening into morning. And from these phenomena I expect yet to see the whole. Even now, while I watch year after year, the furnace smokes less and less, the lamp burns stronger, brighter. And a little way beyond me heaven waits to welcome me, where I shall see as I am seen, and know as I am known. Oh blessed hope!
A little longer we follow where the furnace and the lamp lead the way; but when we arrive at yonder world the furnace will be left behind. No cloud and smoke there to obstruct our vision; but the lamp of fire alone remains. It is God’s unvailed glory illuminating the realms of bliss. Oh, weary pilgrim, keep close to the furnace as it moves before you like the pillar with which Jehovah led the twelve tribes in the desert, and it will guide you home. And then it will smoke no more; but the lamp of fire will never go out, for in its exhaustless splendor you shall spend an eternity of joy.
Our subject thus presented, furnishes materials for a few profitable reflections.
1. In this blending of mystery and light which characterizes God’s present manifestations, he has in view the promotion of his own glory. For the pure and unfallen inhabitants of heaven, it may be proper for him to unvail himself and his doings, and allow them to contemplate him in cloudless majesty; but when he turns himself to sinful creatures like us, it is becoming in him whom we have offended not to allow us to approach too near. A jealous reticence marks his revelations. His infinite glory and majesty impress our minds as deeply by what he hides from us, as by what he shows us. His silence is sometimes as awfully eloquent as his speech. The dim, smoking furnace often conveys to us ideas of his incomprehensible might and majesty and greatness as deeply as does the burning lamp.
2. The Most High has designed this obscure and mixed economy of his to be a source of moral discipline to us all.