"In the day of adversity, consider." Eccles. 7:14
If you would be quiet and silent under your present
troubles and trials, then dwell much upon the benefit,
the profit, the advantage that has redounded to your
souls by all your former troubles and afflictions.
Oh! consider, how by former afflictions the Lord has
revealed sin, prevented sin, and mortified sin!
Consider how the Lord by former afflictions has
revealed to you the impotency, the mutability,
the insufficiency, and the vanity of the world,
and all worldly concerns!
Consider how the Lord by former afflictions has melted
your heart, and broken your heart, and humbled your
heart, and prepared your heart for clearer, fuller, and
sweeter enjoyments of Himself!
Consider what pity, what compassion, what affections,
what tenderness, and what sweetness former afflictions
have wrought in you, towards others in misery!
Consider what room former afflictions have made
in your soul for God, for His word, for good counsel,
and for divine comfort!
Consider how by former afflictions the Lord has made
you more partaker of His Christ, His Spirit, His holiness,
His goodness, etc.
Consider how by former afflictions the Lord has made
you to look towards heaven more, to mind heaven more,
to prize heaven more, and to long for heaven more, etc.
Now, who can seriously consider all the good that he
has gotten by former afflictions—and not be silent under
present afflictions? Who can remember those choice, those
great, and those precious profits that his soul has made
of former afflictions, and not reason himself into a holy
silence under present afflictions thusly, "O my soul! has not
God done you much good, great good, special good—by
former afflictions? Yes! O my soul! has not God done that
for you by former afflictions—which you would not undo for
ten thousand worlds? Yes! And is not God, O my soul! as
powerful as ever, as faithful as ever, as gracious as ever,
and as ready and willing as ever—to do you good by present
afflictions, as he has been to do you good by former afflictions?
Yes! Yes! Why, why then do you not sit silent and mute before
Him, under your present troubles, O my soul?"
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Thomas Brooks (1608 - 1680)
Much of what is known about Thomas Brooks has been ascertained from his writings. Born, likely to well-to-do parents, in 1608, Brooks entered Emmanuel College, Cambridge in 1625, where he was preceded by such men as Thomas Hooker, John Cotton, and Thomas Shepard. He was licensed as a preacher of the Gospel by 1640. Before that date, he appears to have spent a number of years at sea, probably as a chaplain with the fleet.After the conclusion of the First English Civil War, Thomas Brooks became minister at Thomas Apostle's, London, and was sufficiently renowned to be chosen as preacher before the House of Commons on December 26, 1648. His sermon was afterwards published under the title, 'God's Delight in the Progress of the Upright', the text being Psalm 44:18: 'Our heart is not turned back, neither have our steps declined from Thy way'. Three or four years afterwards, he transferred to St. Margaret's, Fish-street Hill, London. In 1662, he fell victim to the notorious Act of Uniformity, but he appears to have remained in his parish and to have preached as opportunity arose. Treatises continued to flow from his pen.[3]
Thomas Brooks was a nonconformist preacher. Born into a Puritan family, he was sent to Emmanuel College, Cambridge. He soon became an advocate of the Congregational way and served as a chaplain in the Civil War. In 1648 he accepted the rectory of St. Margaret's, New Fish Street, London, but only after making his Congregational principles clear to the vestry.
On several occasions he preached before Parliament. He was ejected in 1660 and remained in London as a Nonconformist preacher. Government spies reported that he preached at Tower Wharf and in Moorfields. During the Great Plague and Great Fire he worked in London, and in 1672 was granted a license to preach in Lime Street. He wrote over a dozen books, most of which are devotional in character. He was buried in Bunhill Fields.