Thou wilt save the afflicted people.

"Thou wilt save the afflicted people."—Ps. 18:27.

To be numbered among "the afflicted people," need not cast us down. We are not  made outcasts, as if God were shaking us off like withered leaves, to leave us to perish, and think on us no more. He will "save the afflicted people." This was the confidence which David knew to repose in Him when brought very low; and this was the confidence with which a Greater than David leaned upon Him when He was brought lower still.

It is salvation that the afflicted need. Their case is a much more desperate one than they imagine. It is not mere help, or comfort, or relief, that they need. It is salvation. Their saddest case needs no more, but their least affliction needs no less.

And in God there is salvation for them. He who afflicts is the same that delivers. The smiter is the Saviour. The wounder is the healer. Into His hands we commend ourselves, that He may undertake for us. He that is our God is the God of salvation; and this is enough both to assure us that the trial will not be too bitter, and that deliverance will come in due time. When it comes, it will be complete.

There is no real evil in affliction, except that which we put into it ourselves by our perversity. There is only good. Not to be afflicted, is the worst affliction that can come upon us.