From J. C. Philpot's Daily Portions
August 22 "Continue in the things which you have learned and have
been assured of." 2 Timothy 3:14 Various hindrances meet the child of God in his path
heavenwards. And their tendency is such, that but for the grace of God, they
would effectually succeed in driving him from the faith. When, then, he has
to meet a head wind blowing right in his teeth, when the storm and hail beat
roughly upon him, when the waves rise high and the stream runs strong, there
seems no getting on; and he fears that he shall be like "the children of
Ephraim, who, being armed, and carrying bows, turned back in the day of
battle." And yet there is that grace implanted in his heart, there is that
faith which God the Spirit first created and still keeps alive in his soul,
that though he may for a moment be driven aside, he yet never turns his back
upon the truth; though retarded for a moment, his face is still Zionwards. I can say for myself, that all the trials I have passed
through, all the temptations I have been in, and all the persecutions I have
had to endure, from sinner and from saint, have only served to rivet the
truth of God more firmly in my heart. I find the trials, sufferings,
exercises from without and from within, instead of driving faith out of the
soul, having that effect which Satan would produce by them, and driving the
heart from truth into error, from the Church of God into the world--I can
say, from feeling experience, that these inward and outward trials only
rivet the truth, and the love of the truth, more deeply in my heart; and
instead of driving out faith, they have only tended to strengthen,
encourage, and confirm it.