A Token for Mourners, Part 5
4. I come now to the last thing proposed, namely, the means of curing and preventing these sinful excesses of sorrow for the death of our dear Relations.
And although much hath been said already to disswade from this evil; and I have enlarged already much beyond my first intention; yet I shall cast in some farther help and assistance towards the healing of this distemper, by prescribing the following Rules:
1. Rule.
If you would not mourn excessively for the loss of creature-comforts, then beware that you set not your delight and love excessively or inordinately upon them whilst you enjoy them.
Strong affections make strong afflictions, the higher the Tyde, the lower the Ebb. According to the measure of our delight in the enjoyment, is our grief in the loss of these things. The Apostle knits these two graces Temperance and Patience together in the Precept, 2 Pet. 1. 16. And it's very observable how Intemperance and Impatience are inseparably linked in experience, yea, the experience of the best men. You read Gen. 37. 3. How Israel loved Joseph more than all his children, because he was the son of his old age; and he made him a coat of many colours.
This was the darling, Jacobs heart was exceedingly set upon him, his very life was bound up in the life of the Lad. Now when the supposed death of this child was brought to him; How did he carry it? See Ver. 34, 35. And Jacob rent his cloaths, and put sackcloth upon his loins, and mourned for his Son many days: And all his sons and all his daughters rose up to comfort him, but he refused to be comforted; and he said, for I will go down into the grave to my Son mourning: Thus his Father wept for him.
Here as in a glass, the effects of excessive love to a child are represented. Here you may see what work immoderate love will make, even in a sanctified heart.
O therefore let your moderation be known to all men, in your delights and sorrows about earthly things; for ordinarily the proportion of the one is answerable to the other.
2. Rule.
If you would not be overwhelmed with grief for the loss of your Relations, be exact and careful in discharging your duties to them while you have them.
The testimony of your Conscience that you have laboured in all things to discharge the duties you owed to your Relations whilst they were with you, will prove an excellent allay to your sorrows for them, when they are no longer yours. 'Tis not so much the single affliction, as the guilt charged upon us in times of affliction, that makes our load so heavy.
O what a terrible thing is it to look upon our dead, whilst Conscience is accusing and upbraiding us for our duties neglected, and such or such sins committed? O you little think how dreadful a spectacle this will make the dead body of thy friend to thee.
Conscience if not quite stupid, or dead, will speak at such a time. O therefore as ever you would provide for a comfortable parting at death, or meet again at Judgment; be exact, punctual and circumspect in all your relative duties.
3. Rule.
If you would not be overwhelmed by trouble for the loss of your Relations, then turn to God under your trouble, and pour out your sorrows by prayer into his bosom.
This will ease and allay your troubles: Blessed be God for the ordinance of prayer; How much are all the Saints beholding to it at all times, but especially in heart sinking and distressful times! It's some relief, when in distress we can pour out our trouble into the bosom of a Wife, or faithful Friend; How much more when we leave our complaint before the gracious, wise and faithful God? I told you before of that holy man, who having lost his dear and only Son, got to his Closet; there poured out his soul freely to the Lord, and when he came down to his friends that were waiting below to comfort him, and fearing how he would bear that stroke; he came from his duty with a chearful countenance, telling them, he would be content to bury a Son (if it were possible) every day, provided he might but enjoy such comfort as his soul had found in that private hour.
Go thy way, Christian, to thy God, get thee to thy knees in the cloudy and dark day; retire from all Creatures that thou mayst have thy full liberty with thy God, and there pour out thy heart before him, in free, full and broken-hearted confessions of sin: Judge thy self worthy of Hell as well as of this trouble: Justifie God in all his smartest strokes; beg him in this distress to put under thee the evering arms: intreat one smile, one gracious look to inlighten thy darkness and chear thy drooping spirit. Say with the Prophet, Jer. 17. 17, Be not then a terrour to me, thou art my hope in the day of evil. And try what relief such a course will afford thee. Surely if thy heart be sincere in this course, thou shalt be able to say with that holy man, Psal. 94. 19. In the multitude of my thoughts which I had within me, thy comforts have delighted my soul.
4. Rule.
If you would bear the loss of your dear Relations with moderation, eye God in the whole process of the affliction more, and secondary causes and circumstances of the matter less.
I was dumb, I opened not my mouth; because thou didst it, Psal. 39. 9. Consider the hand of the Lord in the whole matter: And that
First, As a Soveraign hand, which hath right to dispose of thee and all thy comforts without thy leave or consent, Job 33. 13.
Secondly, As a Fathers hand correcting thee in love and faithfulness, Prov. 3. 11. Whom the Lord loveth he correcteth, as a Father the Son in whom he delighteth. O if once you could but see affliction as a rod in a Fathers hand, as proceeding from his love, and intended for your eternal good; How quiet would you then be!
And surely if it draw your heart nearer to God, and mortifie it more to this vain world; it is a rod in the hand of special love: If it end in your love to God, doubt not but it comes from Gods love to you.
Thirdly, As a just and righteous hand: Hast thou not procured this to thy self by thy own folly? Yea, the Lord is just in all that is come upon thee: Whatever he hath done, yet he hath done thee no wrong.
Fourthly, Lastly, As a moderate and merciful hand that hath punished thee less than thine iniquities deserve; he hath cast thee into affliction, he might justly have cast thee into Hell. It's of the Lords mercy that thou art not consumed. Why doth the living man complain?
5. Rule.
If you would bear your affliction with moderation, compare it with the affliction of other men, and that will greatly quiet your spirits.
You have no cause to say God hath dealt bitterly with you, and that there is no sorrow like your sorrow: Look round about you and impartially consider the conditions that others are in: and they nothing inferiour to you in any respect. You have one dead child, Aaron had two at a stroke, Job all at one stroke: and both these by an immediate stroke from the hand of God. Some godly Parents have lived to see their children dye in their sin by the hand of Justice: others have seen them live to the dishonour of God, and breaking of their own spirits: and would have esteemed it a mercy if they had dyed from the womb, and given up the ghost when they came out of the belly, as Job speaks.
In what misery, have some Parents seen their children lye? God holding them as so many terrible spectacles of misery before their eyes; so that they have beg'd the Lord with importunity, to let loose his hand and cut them off. Death being in their esteem, nothing to those continual agonies in which they have seen them lye sweltering from day to day. Oh you little know what a bitter cup others have had given them to drink! Surely if you compare, you must say, the Lord hath dealt gently and graciously with you.
6. Rule.
Carefully shun and avoid whatsoever may renue your sorrow, or provoke you to impatience.
Increase not your sorrow by the sight of, or discourses about sad objects, but labour to avoid them as occasions presented by the enemy of your souls, to draw forth the corruptions of your hearts.
I told you before, why Jacob would not have the child of which Rachel dyed called after the name his wife had given, Benoni, the Son of my sorrow; lest it should prove a daily occasion of renuing his trouble for the loss of his dear Wife; but he called his name Benjamin.
Your impatience is like tinder, or Gun-powder, so long as you can prevent the sparks from falling on it, there is no great danger: But you that carry such dangerous prepared matter in your own hearts, cannot be too careful to prevent them. Do by murmuring as you do by blasphemous thoughts, think quite another way, and give no occasion.
7. Rule.
In the day of your mourning for the death of your friends, seriously consider your own death as approaching, and that you and your dead are distinguisht but by a small interval and point of time.
2 Sam. 12. 23. I shall go to him. Surely the thoughts of your own death, as approaching also, will greatly allay your sorrows for the dead, that are gone before you.
We are apt to fancy a long life in the world, and then the loss of those comforts which we promised our selves so much of the sweetness and comfort of our lives from, seems an intollerable thing.
But would you reallize your own deaths more, you would not be so deeply concerned for their death as you are. Could you but look into your own graves more seriously, you would be able to look into your friends grave more composedly.
And thus I have finished what I designed from this Scripture. The Father of mercies, and God of all comfort, whose sole Prerogative it is to comfort them that are cast down, write all his truths upon your hearts, that they may abide there, and reduce your disorder'd affections to that frame which best suits the will of God, and the profession you make of subjection and resignation thereunto.
FINIS.
End of the text · John Flavel, A Token for Mourners (1674)