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"Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like
it; it is even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be saved out of
it" (Jeremiah 30:7).
THIS "day of
trouble" is when sin is laid as a heavy burden upon a man's conscience;
when guilt presses him down into the dust of death, when his iniquities stare
him in the face, and seem more in number than the hairs of his head; when he
fears he shall be cast for ever into the bottomless pit of hell, and have his
portion with the hypocrites. This
"day of trouble" is not literally a day, a portion of time meted out
by the rising or setting sun, a space of twenty-four hours. The hands of a clock, or the shadow of a
dial, cannot regulate spiritual troubles.
A day here means a season, be it long or short; be it a day, week, month
or year. And as the season cannot be
measured in length, so the trouble cannot be measured in depth.
The only wise God
deals out various measures of affliction to his people. All do not sink to the same depth, as all do
not rise to the same height. All do not
drink equally deep of the cup; yet all, each in their measure, pass through
this day of trouble, wherein their fleshly religion is pulled to pieces, their
self-righteousness marred, their presumptuous hopes crushed, and they brought
into the state of the leper, to cry, "Unclean, unclean." Until a man has passed through this day of
trouble, until he has experienced more or less of these exercises of soul, and
known guilt and condemnation in his conscience; until he has struggled in this
narrow pass, and had his rags of creature righteousness torn away from him, he
can know nothing experimentally of the efficacy of Jesus' atoning blood, nor
feel the power of Christ's resurrection.
