Attributes of God - Charnock - XLV - Chapter 12 (God's goodness) continued

Required reading
Attributes of God by Charnock (Available from Amazon or free on the internet, here for example) - Continue Chapter 12 (A discourse upon the goodness of God) by reading up to the paragraph commencing 'V. I shall now come to the use. First, Of instruction.'

My summary
Today we read Charnock's point about God's goodness in his government.

God's goodness is evident in:
(i) the care he hath of all creatures;
(ii) the preservation of human society;
(iii) encouraging anything of moral goodness in the old;
(iv) providing a Scripture as a rule to guide us, and continuing it in the world;
(v) conversations of men;
(vi) answering prayers;
(vii) bearing with the infirmities of his people, and accepting imperfect obedience;
(viii) afflictions and persecutions;
(ix) temptations.

What grabbed me
This point probably should have been in redemption, but it is excellent: 'His goodness appears in converting men possessed with the greatest enmity against him, while he was dealing with them. All were in such a state, and framing contrivances against him, when Divine goodness knocked at the door (Col. i. 21). He looked after us when our backs were turned upon him, and sought us when we slighted him, and were a 'gainsaying people' (Rom. x. 21); when we had shaken off his convictions, and contended with our Maker, and mustered up the powers of nature against the alarms of conscience; struggled like wild bulls in a net, and blunted those darts that stuck in our souls. Not a man that is turned to him, but had lifted up the heel against his gospel grace, as well as made light of his creating goodness. Yet it hath employed itself about such ungrateful wretches, to polish those knotty and rugged pieces for heaven; and so invincibly, that he would not have his goodness defeated by the fierceness and rebellion of the flesh. Though the thing was more difficult in itself (if any thing may be said to have a difficulty to omnipotency) than to make a stone live, or to turn a straw into a marble pillar. The malice of the flesh makes a man more unfit for the one, than the nature of the straw unfits it for the other.'

The goodness of God in converting ungrateful wretches like me is incredible.

Next week's reading
Continue Chapter 12 (A discourse upon the goodness of God) by reading up to the paragraph commencing 'The second use is a use of comfort.'

Now it's your turn
Please post your own notes and thoughts in the comments section below.