Taking Hold of God’s Providence

7 "And now, O Lord, for what do I wait? My hope is in you.

8 Deliver me from all my transgressions. Do not make me the scorn of the fool!

9 I am mute; I do not open my mouth, for it is you who have done it.

10 Remove your stroke from me; I am spent by the hostility of your hand.

11 When you discipline a man with rebukes for sin, you consume like a moth what is dear to him; surely all mankind is a mere breath! Selah - Psalm 39:7-11

God’s ways are not our ways. He is sovereign over all. Trials may come as a result of God’s discipline or even to test us. When we endure and persevere, taking hold of God’s providence, we are conquerors.

“Sometimes God lays smarting pain with his own hand on the flesh of his people, on purpose to try their graces ; when we endure the pain without murmuring at providence, then it is we come off conquerors. Christian submission and silence under the hand of God, is one way to victory. " I was dumb," says David, " and opened not my mouth ; because thou didst it." Psal. xxxix. 9. Our love to God, our resignation to his will, our holy fortitude and our patience find a proper trial in such smarting seasons. Perhaps when some severe pain first seizes and surprises us, we find ourselves like a wild bull in a net, and all the powers of nature are thrown into tumult and disquietude, so that we have no possession of our own spirits ; but when the hand of God has continued us a while under this divine discipline, we learn to bow down to his sovereignty, we lie at his footstool calm and composed; he brings our haughty and reluctant spirits down to his foot, and makes us lie humble in the dust, and we wait with patience the hour of his release.” Isaac Watts