I need not dwell upon that very familiar metaphor of the furnace for
gold, and the fining-pot for silver, only remember that there are two
purposes for which metallurgists apply fire to metals. The one is to
test them, and the other is to cleanse them, or, to use technical words,
one is for the purpose of assaying them, and the other is for the
purpose of refining them. And so, linking the words of my text with the
words of the previous verse, we find that the Apostle lays it down that
the purpose of all the diverse trials, or 'temptations' as he calls
them, that come to us, is this one thing, that our faith should be
'tried,' and 'found, unto praise and honour and glory.' The fire carries
away the dross; it makes the pure metal glow in its lustre. It burns up
the 'wood, hay, stubble'; it makes the gold gleam and the precious
stones coruscate and flash.
And so note this general notion here of the intention of all life's
various aspects being to test character is specialised into this, that
it is meant to test faith, first of all. Of course it is meant to test
many other things. A man's whole character is tested by the experiences
of his daily life, all that is good and all that is evil in him, and we
might speak about the effect of life's discipline upon a great many
different sides of our nature. But here the whole stress is put upon the
effect of life in testing and clarifying and strengthening one part of a
Christian's character, and that is his faith. Why does Peter pick out
faith? Why does he not say 'trial of your hope,' of your 'love,' of your
'courage,' of half a dozen other graces? Why 'the trial of your
_faith_?' For this reason, because as the man's faith is, so is the man.
Because faith is the tap-root, in the view of the New Testament, of all
that is good and strong and noble in humanity. Because if you strengthen
a man's trust you strengthen everything that comes from it. Reinforce
the centre and all is reinforced. Your faith is the vital point from
which your whole life as Christians is developed, and whatever
strengthens that strengthens you. And, therefore, although everything
that befalls you calls for the exercise of, and therefore tests, and
therefore, rightly undergone, strengthens a great many various virtues
and powers and beauties in a human character, the main good of it all is
that it deepens, if the man is right, his simple trust in God manifested
by his trust in and love to Jesus Christ: and so it reinforces the faith
which works by love, and thus tends to make all things in life good and
fair.
Now if thus the main end of life is to strengthen faith, let us remember
that we have to give a wider meaning to the word 'trials' than
'afflictions.' Ah! there is as sharp a trial of my faith in prosperity
as in any adversity. People say, 'It is easy to trust God when things
are going well with us.' That is quite true. But it is a great deal
easier to stop trusting God, or thinking about Him, when things are
going well with us, and we do not seem to need Him so much, as in the
hours of darkness. You remember the old story about the traveller, when
the sun and the wind tried which could make him take off his cloak; and
the sun did it. Some of us, I daresay, have found out that the faith
which gripped God when we felt we needed Him, because we had not
anything else but Him, is but too apt to lose hold of Him when fleeting
delights and apparent treasures come and whisper invitations in our
hearts. There are diseases that are proper to the northern, dark,
ice-bound regions of the earth. Yes! and there are a great many more
that belong to the tropics; as there is such a thing as sunstroke, which
is, perhaps, as dangerous as the cramping cold from the icebergs of the
north. Some of us should understand what that Scripture means: 'Because
they have no changes, therefore they fear not God.' Prosperity,
untroubled lives, lives even as the lives of those of the majority of
mankind now, have their own most searching trials of faith.
But on the other hand, if there are 'ships that have gone down at sea,
when heaven was all tranquillity,' there come also dark and nights of
wild tempest when we have to lay to and ride out the gale with a
tremendous strain on the cable. Our sorrows, our disappointments, our
petty annoyances, and the great irrevocable griefs that sooner or later
darken the very earth, are all to be classified under this same purpose,
'that the trial of your faith ... might be found unto praise and honour
and glory.' And so, I beseech you, open your eyes to the meaning of
life, and do not suppose that you have found the last word to say about
it when you say 'I am afflicted,' or 'I am at ease.' The affliction and
the ease, like two wheels in some great machine working in opposite
directions, fit with their cogs into one another and move something
beyond them in one uniform direction. And affliction and ease cooperate
to this end, that we might be partakers of His holiness.
I believe experience teaches the most of us, if we will lay its lessons
to heart, that the times when Christian people grow most in the divine
life is in their times of sorrow. One of the old divines says, 'Grace
grows best in winter'; and there are edible plants which need a touch of
frost before they are good to eat. So it is with our faith. Only let us
take care that the fire does not burn it up, as 'wood, hay, stubble,'
but irradiates it and glorifies it, as 'gold, silver, and precious
stones.'