A practical exposition on the 130th Psalm

2. The Wisdom of God is also to be Considered and submitted unto. Job 9. 4. He is wise in heart who hath hardened himself against him and prospered. This the Prophet joins with his Greatness and Sovereignty, Isa. 40. 12, 13, 14. There is no searching of his understanding, v. 28. And the Apostle winds up all his Considerations of the works of God in an holy Admiration of his Knowledge and Wisdom, whence his Judgement becomes unsearchable, and his ways past finding out, Rom. 11. 33, 34. He seeth and knoweth all things, in all their Causes, Effects, consequences and circumstances, in their utmost reach and tendency in their correspondencies one unto another, and suitableness unto his own Glory, and so alone judgeth aright of all things. The wisest of men as David speaks walk in a shade. We see little, we know little, and that but of a very few things, and in an imperfect manner; and that of their present ⟨p. 387⟩appearances, abstracted from their Issues, Successes, Ends, and Relations unto other things. And if we would be further wise in the works of God, we shall be found to be like the wild Asses Colt. What is good for us or the Church of God; what is evil to it or us, we know not at all; but all things are open and naked unto God. The day will come indeed wherein we shall have such a prospect of the works of God, see one thing so set against another, as to find Goodness, Beauty, and Order in them all; that they were all done in number, weight and measure; that nothing could have been otherwise without an abridgement of his glory and disadvantage of them that believe in him. But for the present all our wisdom consists in referring all unto him. He who doth these things is infinitely wise, he knows what he doth, and why, and what will be the end of all. We are apt, it may be, to think, that at such seasons all things will go to wrack with our selves, with the Church, or with the whole world; how can this breach be repaired, this loss made up, this ruin recovered? peace is gone, trade is gone, our substance is gone, the Church is gone, all is gone, confusion and utter desolation lye at the door. But if a man who is unskilled and unexperienced should be at Sea, it may be every time the vessel wherein he is, seems to decline on either side, he would be apt to conceive, they should be all cast away;