Some providences, like Hebrew letters, must be read backwards.
Interpretation
Some experiences and understandings in life may only make sense when viewed from a different perspective.
In this quote, John Flavel suggests that certain challenges or events in life may initially seem confusing or difficult to understand, much like Hebrew letters which are read from right to left. This metaphor implies that understanding comes with time and reflection, indicating that the true meaning or value of experiences may only become clear when observed from a different angle or after some contemplation.
In practice
In a motivational speech about overcoming challenges, this quote can be used to encourage looking at struggles in a new way.
All the tears of a penitent sinner, should he shed as many as there have fallen drops of rain, since the creation, to this day, cannot wash away one sin. The everLasting burnings in hell, cannot purify the flaming conscience, from the least sin.
All the dark, intricate, puzzling providences at which we were sometimes so offended...we shall [one day] see to be to us, as the difficult passage through the wilderness was to Israel, "the right way to the city of habitation".
Providence is like a curious piece of tapestry made of a thousand shreds, which, single, appear useless, but put together, they represent a beautiful history to the eye.
The carnal person fears man, not God. The strong Christian fears God, not man. The weak Christian fears man too much, and God too little.
Whatsoever we have over-loved, idolized, and leaned upon, God has from time to time broken it, and made us to see the vanity of it; so that we find the readiest course to be rid of our comforts is to set our hearts inordinately upon them.
It is the duty of the saints, especially in times of straights, to reflect upon the performances of Providence for them in all the states and through all the stages of their lives.
We must show that liberty is not merely one particular value but that it is the source and condition of most moral values. What a free society offers to the individual is much more than what he would be able to do if only he were free. We can therefore not fully appreciate the value of freedom until we know how a society of free men as a whole differs from one in which unfreedom prevails.
One of the troubles of our times is that we are all, I think, precocious as personalities and backward as characters.
You can have an interesting story about a person living an interesting life. And if it's done well, that is just as engaging as the end of the world. A million people dying - we can't process. One person, we can process.
Experience demonstrates that there may be a wages of slavery only a little less galling and crushing in its effects than chattel slavery, and that this slavery of wages must go down with the other.
One may say that in a state of science where fundamental concepts have to be changed, tradition is both the condition for progress and a hindrance. Hence, it usually takes a long time before the new concepts are generally accepted.
Worry implies that we don't quite trust God is big enough, powerful enough, or loving enough to take care of what's happening in our lives.
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