Bruised Reed: His tender care

Here is the last post in the Bruised Reed series:

We often find ourselves hiding from God when we feel bruised and rubbish. So far we have seen that Christ is our comfort in our bruising, that our bruising brings about some good and that Christ is a good physician and calls us to Him. And so what shall we do at this point in time? Sibbes suggests 3 things:

1. Go boldly to the throne of God, do not hide but find comfort in Christ! – “What should we learn from this, but to `come boldly to the throne of grace’ (Heb. 4:16) in all our grievances? Shall our sins discourage us, when he appears there only for sinners? “

Sibbes asks us – “Are you bruised? Be of good comfort, he calls you. Conceal not your wounds, open all before him and take not Satan’s counsel. Go to Christ, although trembling, as the poor woman who said, `If I may but touch his garment’ (Matt. 9:21). We shall be healed and have a gracious answer.”

2. Stay in Christ and do not despair – “If Christ be so merciful as not to break me, I will not break myself by despair, nor yield myself over to the roaring lion, Satan, to break me in pieces.”

3. Be conscious of your weakness so that it makes you run to Christ - “As a mother is tenderest to the most diseased and weakest child, so does Christ most mercifully incline to the weakest. Likewise he puts an instinct into the weakest things to rely upon something stronger than themselves for support. The vine stays itself upon the elm, and the weakest creatures often have the strongest shelters. The consciousness of the church’s weakness makes her willing to lean on her beloved, and to hide herself under his wing”

All of these run on the same theme – run to Christ and do not listen to Satan. Even though we are weak, Christ has allowed us to come to the throne of His Father by His blood. And there at the throne our Father speaks tender words, pouring his love on us through Christ. Therefore do not hide in darkness, but cling to Christ and find comfort.

And therefore to conclude this section of the Bruised Reed with Sibbes encouraging us more:

“His tenderest care is over the weakest. The lambs he carries in his bosom (Isa. 40:11). He says to Peter, `Feed my lambs’ (John 21:15). He was most familiar and open to troubled souls. How careful he was that Peter and the rest of the apostles should not be too much dejected after his resurrection! `Go your way, tell his disciples and Peter’ (Mark 16:7). Christ knew that guilt of their unkindness in leaving of him had dejected their spirits. How gently did he endure the unbelief of Thomas and stooped so far unto his weakness, as to suffer him to thrust his hand into his side.”

Into the wilderness

At the weekend we had Forum SW where Bish went through a series about the love of God and he shared with us this verse:

“Therefore, behold, I will allure her,
and bring her into the wilderness,
and speak tenderly to her.”
(Hosea 2:14 ESV)

In an earlier post I wrote about how God is our Husband and here we see how the Lord treats his bride. Now what really struck me was this question:

“When you think about God speaking to you, what does He sound like?”

Often we think when God speaks it would be with harsh words or something very frightening. But when you read this verse in Hosea it says something totally different, the Lord speaks to her tenderly. He speaks with tender comforting words and the amazing thing is that she is in the wilderness when this happens. The Lord allures her out of where she is, which is in prostituting herself to idols and he allures her, bids her with a higher bidding to bring her into a wilderness, he brings her out of slavery and he speaks words of comfort to her.

This is a beautiful example of the Gospel and the heart of our Lord. Here we are, committing adultery with worthless idols and Christ doesn’t speak to us with harsh, wrathful words instead he allures us, he wins and woos us out of the slavery of idols and sin and he brings us into a place where he can speak wonderful words of comfort and tenderness to us.

Don’t we need to hear those words of comfort? Don’t we need to be allured and won away from the snares of broken fountains that never quench our thirst? Jesus says “come to me all who are weary and heavy laden”. Come to Him, gaze on Him, shelter in Him and he will win your heart and speak tenderly to you.

But more than this, doesn’t it change the way we do evangelism? How do we share the Gospel – with harsh words? condemning people’s sin through the law? Or do we show them Christ and let him speak tenderly to them, let him allure them? Do we win people to see the love of Christ?

We all need to hear the tender words of Christ and when we do, may they warm our dead, cold hearts.