Are you saying, my troubles are many, my burden is great, and hope deferred makes the heart sick? True, a faint heart makes weak hands and feeble knees; then afflictions become intolerable, duty tiresome, prayer irksome, the ordinances unprofitable, the lamp of spiritual life seems expiring, the poor sinner grows dejected and dispirited, is ready to give up hope, and to give way to despondency. The Comforter inspires a work for such, "Lift up the hands which hang down." Do you say, the advice is good, but the practice hard? Paul supposes it; for he introduces it with Wherefore. O, I dearly love these Scripture adverbs! Much courage and comfort are gained by attending to them. Wherefore, or for Which reason, lift up your weak hands, or the weak hands of others. Consider why, or wherefore, we should do this.
We have Jesus to look unto for patience. He is the author and finisher of our faith; be bore our sins; he hath for ever taken away the curse due to them; he has made our peace with God; God is in him reconciled to us. He who endured the cross for our sins, and despised the shame of being treated as a malefactor, is now before the throne of God praying for us. O, this look is reviving!
Consider Jesus, the captain of our salvation, lest ye be weary and faint. He was "made perfect through sufferings, that he might bring many sons unto glory." He is bringing you, "through much tribulation," into his kingdom. Consider the love and sorrows of Jesus for you. Look on yourself as a suffering member of a once suffering head: so shall your weak mind be strengthened and your weary mind refreshed.
Forget not, but consider the exhortation, My Son. Precious appellation! God is your Father; he loves you with the same everlasting and unchangeable love as he did his only begotten Son: he treats you in love; he chastises you as his child. Why? Because he is in wrath against you? No; but to make you more like himself in holiness. O then "lift up your hands" to your God and Redeemer in confident faith, in humble prayer. Though all within is clouded dejection, yet all above is sunshine, joy, peace, and consolation. Consider your hope. It is as "an anchor of the soul." On what is it fixes. It entereth into that within the vail, whither the fore-runner is for us entered, even Jesus." Hebrews 6:19, 20.
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