Chapter. 24. Helps to put on Faith in any undertaking.
infinite mercy bestowed upon us by God. And were we not certain of God's mercy in that regard, knowing our own unbelieving hearts, we might fear, and even conclude, that we would fail.
Chapter 24 Helps to cultivate Faith in any undertaking:
1. Look to the example of your great leader, Jesus Christ.
2. Prepare yourself for the work of Faith through humility.
3. Renew your Faith in the Covenant of Grace.
4. In difficult times, engage your Faith to purify your heart.
5. Be cautious of shifting ways and dependencies.
6. Let go of your own personal interests.
7. Entrust yourselves to the word of God.
8. Pray and plead the word with God.
9. Do not reject any means that God provides.
10. Do not approach the task with a servile spirit.
11. Do not be discouraged by past failures.
12. Be cautious of being driven by passionate emotions in your work.
13. Recognise the interdependence between different tasks.
14. Do not listen to temptations.
15. Beware of distorted reasoning.
16. Avoid disorderly conduct in four instances.
17. Display resolution and courage.
18. Regard yourselves as instruments of God.
19. Remain steadfast even if you do not see immediate results.
20. Do not worsen the difficulty through your behaviour.
21. Focus on your encouragements.
22. Do not use the difficulty as a reason to argue against the work.
23. Strive to strengthen yourselves through faith against all difficulties.
Now, if God calls you to a service or work that presents difficulties, you can see what will assist you. David, by his Faith in Psalm 18:29, declares that he can break through a troop, leap over a wall, and shatter a bow of steel. Paul also testifies that he can do all things through Christ who strengthens him. Just as Christ spoke about the power of miraculous faith, the same can be said about justifying faith. Even if you had faith as small as a mustard seed, you could command mountains to move and trees to uproot themselves and be planted in the sea, and they would obey you. Similarly, if your faith confronts a deeply rooted sin, it can uproot it and move mountains.
There is nothing weaker and more useless than a superficial and groundless faith, which is merely an opinion and baseless hope.
However, true faith is incredibly strong and beneficial, as it contains the essence of all graces. Just as the root of a plant possesses the virtue and essence of its fruits and branches, faith encompasses the essence of all grace, and therefore, it can accomplish great things. It was said of Luther, who had great faith, that he could do whatever he wanted. The same can be said of faith itself, as the Scripture affirms.
Great faith allows individuals to have their desires fulfilled, as Jesus told the woman, "O woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you desire" (Matthew 15:28). However, it is crucial to exercise faith actively rather than merely possessing it as a dormant quality.
Therefore, to cultivate and activate your faith...
1. Let us look to the example of our great leader, the Lord Jesus Christ. You are aware of the difficult works Christ undertook for the salvation of mankind. These were works that even the angels in heaven and all creatures in the world would have faltered under, but Christ persevered through them. Although his faith was not the same as ours, justifying faith, he had a faith and trust in his Father that helped him overcome great and difficult tasks. In Hebrews 2:12-13, Christ is presented as an example to us, saying, "I will declare your name to my brothers and sisters; in the assembly I will sing your praises." Christ praised God in his own person and also sang praises in the hearts of his people.
Therefore, take this as a comforting note that encourages us in our public duties. While we are praising God, Christ is also praising God. When we sing psalms to God in a gracious manner, Christ is praising God the Father. Furthermore, Christ not only trusted in the Father in his own person but also trusted in the hearts of his people, so that they could be carried through their difficult works.
2. When faced with a challenging task, strive to prepare for the work of faith through humility before undertaking it. Depending on the nature of the difficult service, there should be a corresponding level of humility before embarking on that work.
Therefore, when God calls us to extraordinary works, it is common for His people to prepare for their faith through extraordinary humility. Examples such as Nehemiah, Ezra, and Esther, who were entrusted with great works that required faith, made preparations through extraordinary humility beforehand.
Just as humility was a preparation for faith in the beginning, it is also a preparation for engaging in a new act of faith after we have initially received it.
3. Whenever you are faced with a difficult task, make sure to frequently renew your faith in the great covenant of grace. Don't limit your exercise of faith to that particular work alone, but focus on renewing your faith in the overarching covenant. When the great charter is renewed, the lesser grants will follow. This is how God dealt with Abraham. Whenever Abraham encountered a great challenge, God renewed His covenant with him, affirming, "I am God Almighty." God saw this as a special means to help Abraham persevere. If you have renewed the covenant
(which includes all the promises), it greatly aids your faith. Shall not God, who has given us His Son, also give us all other things?
The soul can reason powerfully in this way.
4. Faith must be actively engaged when undertaking a difficult task in order to purify the heart. Although you believe that God will be with you and strengthen you in the work, unless you use faith to purify your heart alongside belief, you may fail in the task. If there is any sin that lies close to the heart, you will not be capable of accomplishing great things. Sin not only defiles but also weakens. To possess a spirit of power, you must have a sound mind. In Nehemiah 13:3, when they faced a great work, they separated themselves from the mixed company. Similarly, when you embark on any great work, exercise faith to cleanse your hearts from corruption. As David says in Psalm 18:32, "It is
God who arms me with strength and keeps my way secure."
Strength and a perfect way go hand in hand. Therefore, strive for perfection and purity in your relationship with God, and then He will strengthen you.
5. In times of difficulty, strive to exercise faith and detach yourself from all shifting ways and dependencies on worldly things. It is
observed that when working with metals, such as gold, to make the work easier, they mix other metals with it, like lead and tin.
Although this makes the process smoother, the end result is of lesser quality. Similarly, many Christians who lack skill in the ways of God, when facing challenging actions that require effort, mix in their own carnal strategies and shifting methods to make the task easier. However, even though it becomes easier to accomplish, the end result is worse than if they had put in more effort. Labour to exercise faith and detach yourself from dependencies on worldly things. If your heart is devoted to God alone through faith, you can achieve mighty things. If you try to have a backup plan or rely on other means in case one fails, you will never accomplish anything significant. Therefore, when God intends to use His people to do great things, He first removes their reliance on worldly help they had before. This is illustrated in the story of Moses. In Acts 7:22, it is said that Moses was an eloquent man and powerful in speech. However, if you read
Exodus 4:10, Moses himself complains that he is slow of speech and not eloquent. The explanation is that Moses was indeed capable of powerful words, but when God assigned him this task, He diminished Moses' eloquence so that he would depend on God even more than before. I cannot confirm the truth of this observation, but it is certainly God's way to remove creaturely helps from individuals in order for them to rely solely on faith.
When creatures are relied upon, it often diminishes the honour due to God. Therefore, when Gideon had too many soldiers, God said it was too large a multitude to deliver His people.
6. Faith must also detach us from our own ends and involve God in the task as much as possible. Let God be evident in the work, even if we are not seen. Let God receive the glory, even if the one
who accomplished the difficult work remains unknown. Great things are achieved when God is involved in the task. It is a special work of faith to divert our focus from our own ends. If, when approaching a great work, you intend to exercise faith but fail to be detached from your own ends, faith loses its virtue and power.
7. When faced with a difficult task, let us strive to exercise faith by placing ourselves upon the Word. Find a promise and rely on it, entrusting ourselves and the power of our work to that word. For instance, if the task is to subdue a particular sin, consider the word in Romans 6:14, "Sin shall not have dominion over you."
Esteem the word more highly than all your efforts to combat sin.
If the challenge is to free yourself from the guilt of conscience and escape its terror, remember the word in Romans 8:1, "There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." If the work involves fulfilling a calling, meditate on the word that virtually contains a promise: "He works all our works in us and for us" (Isaiah 26:12). If you face opposition, hold on to the word given to Joshua, "I will be with you and will not leave you"
(Joshua 1:5). Exercise faith to grasp a word and rest your souls upon it.
8. Take this word and present it to God in prayer when you encounter a difficulty. Show God His own bond, so to speak.
Though God binds Himself, He waits for the creature to come and present His promises. Upon seeing and pleading the bond with God, He is inclined to come to our aid. God is greatly pleased when His servants, in times of difficulty, approach Him and plead His promises. The conversion of promises into prayer, the infusion of faith into prayer, is a powerful approach to God.
Just as there are certain physical substances that possess great effects but only work when distilled or taken with specific substances, faith, when distilled and intermingled with prayer, works effectively. If a physician asks, "How did you take such a thing?" and you respond, "I swallowed it," the physician may say, "You should have taken it with such and such substance, then it would have worked." Similarly, you may believe that God will help you, but have you distilled your faith into prayer? Have you taken it in the act of pleading with God to fulfill His word?
This is a significant means of accomplishing great things.
9. Faith must not reject any means. If God presents any means in your path, accept them gratefully and use them faithfully, diligently, and carefully, as if they were the only means available. Idleness and presumption are contrary to faith.
Therefore, be faithful in employing the means. As observed, God stated that He brought the people into Canaan by His mighty power and outstretched arm. However, there were also numerous valiant soldiers and a mighty host of people. Despite the presence of means, faith knows how to attribute the glory to God's outstretched arm, understanding that all secondary causes operate through the power of the First.
10. Let us be cautious that when we undertake any task, we do not approach it with a servile spirit, merely compelled to do it.
Instead, let us view every duty as a work of the Gospel. Those who perform duties out of a slavish spirit will never persevere.
By faith, we are to regard all duties as works of the Gospel, not as works of the Covenant of Works, but as works of the Covenant of Grace. This is evident in the case of Zerubbabel in Zechariah
4. God declares that mountains will be made plain before
Zerubbabel, and how is this accomplished? In verse 7, it is said that at the laying of the cornerstones, they shall cry, "Grace, grace," magnifying the grace of God. They look beyond
Zerubbabel's strength and rely on the grace of God. By adopting a spiritual mindset and exclaiming "Grace, grace," they are enabled to overcome difficulties and make the path smooth.
Therefore, when you embark on any significant work, when you lay the foundation, cry out, "Grace, grace." Recognise that this is a work in which you must depend on the free grace of God for assistance, acceptance, blessing, and guidance. The more you exalt the grace of God in any work, the more empowered you will be to complete it.
11. You must not be discouraged by past failures. If you have undertaken a task and failed in it, and now believe that you have sinned against God to such an extent that you can no longer expect His help, let me tell you that you should not reason based on past failures. Even if you have failed twenty times before, if you now set your heart right for the work and seek wisdom to carry you through, God will not reproach you or say, "Why do you ask for wisdom to do that work when you have attempted it before and ruined it due to the pride and laziness of your heart?
Away with you!" Yes, be humbled for past failures, but do not be discouraged by them, whether in that specific work or any other.
Even if you have begun the work and failed initially, do not be disheartened. Many works have experienced setbacks at the start but ultimately achieved a glorious outcome, especially when failures are due to weakness. Just as Jacob wrestled with the Angel and was struck lame, yet still prevailed, there may be failings and weaknesses in our work, but in the end, there can be
victory. Therefore, do not hinder your faith by being discouraged by previous failures.
12. Be mindful of the disruptive influence of passion when performing your work. Tasks done in a state of anger, stubbornness, or irritation are seldom done well. If you have a servant who is always busy and doing something, but does it with anger, it would be better if they did nothing at all. It is those who possess quiet and meek spirits who can carry out a task smoothly and successfully. Therefore, when engaging in any work that God assigns to us, let us approach it with calm spirits.
"Your strength shall be to sit still," says the Lord in Isaiah 50:7.
The greatest strength of our hearts in performing any task is to remain still and composed. "Stand still and see the salvation of the Lord," as stated in Exodus 14:13. This stillness is not opposed to effort but rather to restlessness and the tumultuousness of our unruly emotions. If you desire the salvation of the Lord and His help in a particular work, why do you not remain still? As long as you are in such a state of disturbance, you are not in a position to receive the salvation of the Lord. Many fail in their work in this manner. It is similar to foolish and ignorant people in a boat. When the boat rocks, they frantically run back and forth, refusing to be still, and as a result, they end up drowning. However, those with skill in the boat will say, "Just sit still, and you will be safe enough." But these individuals believe they need to be hasty in helping themselves, so they run around and capsize the boat upon themselves.
Similarly, the unruly passions in the hearts of people arise when they are engaged in a work and perceive danger. Their emotions become stirred, and they think it is necessary for them to be active in an unruly manner, but in doing so, they bring about
their own downfall. Take note of Moses as an example. Moses was entrusted with the great task of leading the people out of Egypt, and he possessed a very calm spirit for a long time.
However, it was the disturbance of his passion that ultimately caused him to fail in the work. When he struck the rock to obtain water for the people, he did it in a fit of anger instead of sanctifying the name of God. This was the reason for his failure, as described in Psalm 106:32-33. "They angered him also at the waters of Meribah, so that it went ill with Moses for their sake."
You may have carried out some works and experienced God's strengthening, but now you face a more difficult task that unsettles your hearts. Be cautious not to fail at this point. It is a remarkable feat to carry out a difficult task well while maintaining composure. Disquietude and passion hinder progress, as was the case with the people of Israel at the beginning of Exodus. When Moses came to them, they could not listen to him because of their anguish of heart and the weight of their bondage. To apply this spiritually, you may be aware of the severe bondage under certain corruptions, and you may experience great anguish in your spirit as you struggle to overcome these corruptions. However, be careful not to let this turmoil in your heart prevent you from hearkening to the Lord's word and understanding His will correctly. Do not let it hinder you from knowing how to conduct yourself in the right manner.
This was the situation for the Israelites, and it is indeed the case for many people. They are so troubled by the bondage they are in under their corruptions that their hearts are in such turmoil and chaos that they cannot listen to anything that could guide them in this work.
13. Another guideline for directing your Faith to help you in difficult tasks is to observe the dependencies that one task has on another. Many people see a task that God wants them to do and immediately set out to accomplish it, without considering its dependencies on other matters, and as a result, they fail. Let's say a mariner or someone else is assigned the task of pulling a particular cable or rope. They go to the place where they can see that rope and start pulling, but there might be another line holding it in a different location, and they can pull with all their might and still not move the thing they intended. Similarly, many individuals strive, labour, and exert themselves in various duties, but they fail to recognize the secret entanglements that these duties are dependent on, and as a result, they are unable to accomplish their work. Someone may complain about the difficulty of directing their heart towards God in prayer, saying,
"God knows I have been in prayer and have exerted all my strength to lift up my heart as if in the presence of God, but I struggle and strive, and it seems impossible to elevate my heart."
While they strive and make efforts, they may think of certain promises and even exercise faith, but there might be a corruption that seems unrelated to their struggle in prayer, yet it is the very thing that creates the difficulty. In such a case, they should put their faith into action to deliver themselves from that particular corruption, and then their prayer will be more successful. For instance, if you have been struggling to direct your heart to God in prayer, upon closer examination, you may find that it is the stubbornness, peevishness, and anger in your relationships with your family, servants, or spouse that hinders your heart from rising when you come into God's presence. In such a situation, you should have first put your faith into action
to address and resolve those issues. By doing so, you would have been able to lift up your heart. Many people overlook various corruptions and focus on distant duties, striving and exerting themselves, but if they possessed true Christian wisdom, they would consider the difficulties and hindrances that lie between them and the desired duty, and they would strive to remove those obstacles. The same applies to faith. If you find it challenging to believe in God and His promises, there might be a sluggishness of heart in your specific calling, even if you think there is little connection between that and your faith. Similarly, in times of affliction, when you desire your heart to be patient, there might be a sense of dullness and drowsiness within your heart and spirit. Therefore, pay close attention to the corruptions, even if they seem distant, and set your heart against all of them, one as much as another.
14. Additionally, be cautious of listening to temptation. When you are engaged in a difficult task, there will be plenty of temptations. Thoughts may arise, saying, "Why do you bother with this work? Others stronger than you have failed. You're just a weak individual. It's a daunting task." If it is truly the work of the Lord, approach it with a sincere and upright heart. If I fail, so be it, and do not pay attention to temptations. An interesting example is found in Nehemiah 6:3. When Nehemiah was undertaking the great work of God, adversaries tried to lure him away with a false invitation. However, observe his response: "I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come. Why should the work cease while I leave it and come down to you?" Likewise, say to temptation, "Temptation desires my attention, but I am engaged in the work of the Lord. Why should the work cease while I waste my time and energy reasoning with you?"
15. Another guideline for strengthening your faith is to beware of twisted reasoning. For example, when God calls you to a service, you might think, "If only I were capable of doing this and that, then I could believe. But with my current heart, so incapable of accomplishing anything and overcoming any corruption, how can I believe?" What perverse reasoning! Instead, you should reason, "I must believe so that I can do this." It's like saying, "If I had strength, I hope I would be able to work." Well, you need strength to perform your work. Or if someone were to say, "If I were at my destination, I could start my journey." But in reality, you must embark on the journey in order to reach your destination. Similarly, if you were to say, "If I could do such a thing, then I could believe." But how will strength come unless you believe? Will you wait for strength before believing? That's like saying, "I will wait to board the ship until I am already across the sea." Boarding the ship is the means to cross the sea, just as believing is the way to receive strength. Therefore, do not reason from your lack of strength to hinder faith; instead, reason from your lack of strength to further faith.
16. Furthermore, when you embark on a difficult task, be cautious of any disorderly workings of your heart concerning that work.
Disorderly workings of the heart can be identified in two or three aspects.
Firstly, be careful not to focus primarily on the outcome. It is the duty itself that should be the primary focus, rather than obsessing over the outcome. Placing more importance on the outcome than on the duty is a mistake and hinders the work of faith.
Secondly, even if you consider the outcome, avoid fixating on specific results. Although faith assures us of general success, it does not always guarantee specific outcomes.
Thirdly, do not judge the final outcome based on initial hindrances in the work. Many people make the mistake of judging the ultimate result solely based on the difficulties encountered at the beginning.
Fourthly, above all, be cautious of pre-determining that you will have no success. You may think, "I can attempt the work, but it will never progress or thrive." This is akin to a stubborn servant saying, "Well, I can attempt the work, but nothing good will come out of it." Many people undertake the work that God assigns to them, but they have already determined that it will amount to nothing. This is a sinful boldness. Who do you think you are, man or woman, to be so audacious with God? Can you determine the course of God's plans?
You may acknowledge that you deserve no success in what you do, but when it comes to determination, it is boldness and sinfulness against God. Should I determine, being so wretched, that God will bring success to any work I undertake? You may argue that, being so wretched, you deserve God to thwart all your efforts. But do not determine that you will never overcome your hard heart or develop a patient spirit. This is what the prophet condemns in Hosea 7:13:
"Though I have redeemed them, yet they speak lies against me."
Even though God has redeemed people and shown them mercy, they speak lies against God, claiming they will never receive the specific mercy they are laboring for. When God is in the process of redeeming you and stirring your hearts, saying that there will never be success or help is to speak lies against God. Be humbled for your past guilt and be cautious of determining the outcome in the future. Certainly,
regardless of the unworthiness you perceive in yourselves, know that it is a temptation of the Devil and a provoking sin.
17. Furthermore, it is important that alongside our faith, we approach our tasks with resolution and courage. As the Psalmist says in Psalm 31:24, "Be of good courage, and he shall strengthen your heart." So, when you face any difficult task, put on your faith with as much determination as possible. Natural resolution greatly assists in overcoming difficulties. Seneca makes a notable statement: "The mind of man accomplishes whatever it commands itself. If it sets a command and charges upon itself, it can achieve it." Natural resolution is a powerful aid in overcoming difficulties. A person can accomplish more than they initially thought possible. However, when combined with faith, if we can harness our faith and then impose a necessity on the work, saying, "It must be done no matter what happens, for it is the command of God," this greatly propels the work forward.
18. Another rule is that in all the services that God calls you to, consider yourselves as instruments in God's hands, and view the work as God's task assigned by Him and done for Him, not for your own sake. I am nothing but an instrument, like an axe used in building a house. The work is hard and challenging, and it is not mine but God's. I am not the main force behind it, but merely the instrument in the hand of a skilled worker. In His own work, even a weak instrument in the hands of a skilled workman can accomplish great things.
19. Furthermore, whatever work God calls you to do, engage in it and continue doing it, even if you see no immediate results.
Expect God to intervene while you are working, and do not say, "If God were to intervene, then I would have encouragement to continue working." No, work while expecting God to intervene.
Even if you have been working for many years without seeing any results, if God does intervene, it will be while you are working. Just as David said to his son Solomon, "Arise and be doing, and the Lord will be with you" (1 Chronicles 22:16).
Therefore, do not say, "What am I to do without the Lord?"
Instead, be doing, and the Lord will be with you.
20. Additionally, let us be cautious not to increase the difficulty through our disorderly conduct. We are often guilty of this, that when God assigns us a task and there is some hardship involved, we make it even more difficult through our uncooperative behaviour. It is like a person who is in shackles and, by pulling and tugging, ends up tearing the skin off their legs, thereby making it harder to bear the restraints than it was initially.
Similarly, the Israelites who left Egypt and journeyed through the wilderness to reach Canaan made their journey much more arduous due to their conduct. The distance from Egypt to the border of Palestine was only seventy miles, and to Jerusalem, it was merely a hundred miles. Yet, through their improper conduct, they turned it into a forty-year ordeal. Therefore, even though we may indeed have to traverse a wilderness and undertake a difficult work, we should be cautious not to make it more challenging through our complaints. Often, we complain about the difficulty of things when, in reality, they are not inherently difficult. It is the sluggishness of people's spirits and their tendency to complain about the work that makes it seem more difficult.
21. Furthermore, do not solely dwell on the difficulty and focus on those things that are hard, which may discourage you in the work that God has assigned to you. Instead, also consider those things that may encourage you. Whenever there is hardness in a task, people tend to fixate on it and fail to see any sources of comfort. It is as if they keep touching a sore spot on their body, even though it worsens the sore and prevents it from healing.
Similarly, many individuals, when faced with something challenging in their work, constantly dwell on it. Difficulties in any task are like bitter pills that God asks us to swallow. But how childish it would be for someone with bitter pills to chew on them! No wonder they spit them out instead of swallowing them.
They should swallow the pills without chewing them. Likewise, when God presents us with bitter pills, we should not continuously chew on them in our thoughts. Instead, we should obey God's command and continue with our work, striving to swallow difficulties as much as possible. We have a relevant passage in Psalm 86:4-5: "Rejoice the soul of thy servant, for unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul. For thou, Lord, art good and ready to forgive and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon thee." Let us apply it this way: The reason why many people feel dejected in their journey and lack joy and comfort in any aspect of their lives is because they constantly look downward in the dark. Just as a person at the bottom of a deep pit would never see light if they always looked downward, they must look upward to the sun to see the light. Observe David's approach: "Rejoice the soul of thy servant, for unto thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul." If David had allowed his heart to continually sink downward, he would never have experienced joy in his journey. But when he desired joy, he lifted up his
heart. Similarly, if there is a difficult task before you and your heart is troubled, if you seek something that will bring you joy, lift up your soul to God and consider the encouraging ways that He presents to you. "For thou, Lord, art good and ready to forgive and plenteous in mercy." Here is a way to obtain mercy: lifting up one's soul and viewing God as good, ready to forgive, and abundant in mercy. I ask you, when did you lift up your soul and look up to God as plenteous in mercy? You have always looked downward into the depths, seeing only the darkness of God's justice ready to seize upon you. Instead, lift up your soul to God and look towards the sun. We should not continually pore over the things that are difficult but focus on the things that are encouraging.
22. Do not use the difficulties you encounter as a reason to argue against your work or to make yourself disheartened with it, but rather use them to reason against your own hearts. Yes, the work may be challenging, but it is due to my own wretched and sluggish heart, and because I fail to make use of the means and abilities that God has provided. Many others who have fewer resources and assistance than I do can successfully complete even harder tasks. Therefore, strive to reason against your own hearts, not against the work itself. Many people, when they find the work difficult, start to reason against the work itself. They say, "The Lord knows I strive and do what I can, but I face so many obstacles. God does not come in with His grace to help me, and I can do nothing without God. Why is nothing being accomplished?" But is it because the work is hard, or is it because you are not utilizing the power that God has given you?
The safer approach is to reason against yourselves, acknowledging that you have not done everything you can.
Rather than absolving yourselves of any guilt and justifying your inaction, recognize that the real reason nothing is being done lies not so much in the difficulty of the work but in the improper disposition of your hearts. It is crucial to focus on reasoning against your hearts rather than against the work simply because it is difficult.
And to conclude, this is what I say: we should strive to strengthen ourselves through our faith against all difficulties. Just as unbelief is a hardening sin in one way, so faith is a hardening grace in another way. Acts 19:9 says, "But when some were hardened and did not believe." They were hardened because they did not believe. Faith has the opposite effect and can do just as much in what is good as unbelief can do in what is evil. Just as unbelief can make a person so hardened as to be like iron against what is good, faith can make a person as iron against what is evil. Therefore, the Prophet Jeremiah is compared to iron and steel in Jeremiah 15:12, "Can iron break the iron from the north, or the bronze?" God revealed Himself to Jeremiah graciously, and he was hardened by it. Now, of all graces, especially faith, makes the heart as iron for God, just as unbelief makes the heart as iron to resist God. That is why the Apostle exhorts in 2 Peter 1:5, "But also for this very reason, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue." The word "virtue" comes from strength because every virtue displays strength. So it is as if he is saying, add strength to your faith, exert it powerfully, so that it may help you against strong difficulties with a warrior-like power. Virtue has the power to oppose enemies. Therefore, add virtue to your faith. And if we do so, know that it will be a very honourable thing. It is an honour to God and an honour to us to go through difficult things. It is an honour to God, just as David's men, who endured so much and broke through an army to bring him water, brought honour to him. Likewise, for us