Job 1:10

Job 1:10 , Job 1:21

I. Adversity tests the genuineness, the reality, of a man's religious life.

II. Adversity improves the quality of the religious life, so that all true believers are able to say, "It was good for me that I was afflicted." It renders our religious life (1) more thoughtful; (2) more robust; (3) more intense and prayerful; (4) more rounded and complete; (5) more tender and sympathetic.

III. Adversity promotes the permanence and growth of the religious life.

IV. Adversity gives effectiveness, capacity of service and usefulness, to the religious life. Neither the good servant nor the good soldier is trained in luxury for his work. They have both to "endure hardness" and to pass through discipline if they are to attain proficiency and be of real use.

J. C. Harrison, Congregationalist,vol. i., p. 653