2 Chronicles 34:33

REFLECTIONS

READER! let our improvement of this chapter, under the Spirit's teaching, be to remark from the early call of Josiah to the knowledge of the Lord God of his fathers, the blessedness of those who are brought betimes to a saving view of the Lord Jesus Christ, and redemption in his blood. It is an unspeakable mercy, no doubt, and a miracle of grace, at any period, and at any time, when souls are truly converted to Jesus. The laborers in the vineyard at the sixth, and ninth, and eleventh hour, which were called and equally recompensed in the close of the day, give us a rich representation of the free, sovereign grace of our most compassionate and gracious Father. Surely it is a very glorious proof of the sovereignty of God's love and mercy, when we behold men in the meridian of life, and in the midst of all their pursuits of business, or of worldly pleasure, taken aside by the kind hand of the Lord, and brought to the knowledge and love of Jesus. And surely the grace of God is magnified in the conversion of old sinners, who are grown old in sin as well as years, And yet the long current and tide of their affections is made to turn at the command of his voice, who raiseth the dead in trespasses and sins. But we behold with peculiar loveliness the grace the Lord bestows on those whose tender years are seasoned with the love of Jesus. Reader! how doth your experience correspond with either? Hath Jesus, the morning star, risen upon your soul? Hath Jesus the day spring from on high visited you? Can you trace your knowledge of this light and life of man, like Josiah, from your youth? Oh! the unspeakable felicity of knowing him from a child, and becoming acquainted with Jesus from our earliest years? What can equal that joy of the soul arising out of the Lord's manifestation, when speaking to a believer, as he did to Josiah; Because thine heart was tender and thou didst humble thyself before me, I have heard thee also, saith the Lord.

Blessed Jesus! let it please thee to make continued manifestations of thyself to all thy people. Visit our souls in thy word, in thine ordinances, in all thy means of grace, by providences, in blessings, in mercies, in all thy sovereign appointments. And as thou hast given us to see thy beauty, thy loveliness; thy grace, thy suitableness and all-sufficiency; and won our affections to thy love in the moment of conversion; so, Lord Jesus, let us day by day have renewed discoveries of thy love, until at length, after the various manifestations and the sweet visits which thou makest us, we are growing up into an increasing knowledge of thee, an increasing desire after thee, an increasing confidence in thee, and an increasing longing for thee and thy glory, thou wilt take us home to thyself to behold thy fair beauties, and to dwell with thee forever. Amen.