The Judgment Seat of Christ # 4
The only thing that will tie me in victory continually, through the blood of Christ, is that I give Him my adoration and my tribute every day. It's more than my service. It's more than giving money. But I need to love Him, magnify Him, and adore Him. I need to take Him, as it were, by the feet and worship Him. If we all do this, then we will experience real joy and lasting happiness.
Crowns, Crowns, Crowns!
I don't believe there will be any envy in Heaven, but I could remind you that there are at least five crowns to be given in reward. Paul says the Lord will give him a crown of righteousness, which he says the Lord will not only give to him, but to all those who love His appearing (2 Tim. 4:8). There's a crown for the martyrs - those who have died and those yet to die. Crowns, crowns, crowns! We won't all be the same in heaven. There will be great distinctions there. When you see a political convention, you see people holding up signs from California or somewhere. Well, maybe there will be signs in heaven. "These are the Prayer Warriors." "These are the Great Sufferers." "These are the Travailers." "These are the Missionaries." "These are the Failures." All kinds of people are going to be listed in that Great Day. There will be great distinctions between people in heaven.
Take a look at the dying thief. Oh, he'll be in heaven all right because Jesus said he would - but he wasted his life. Then look at John Wesley for example. He was saved soundly when he was 35 years of age, and he served the Lord for the next 53 years. You couldn't think that the dying thief, a man who got in at the last tick of the clock, is going to have the same reward as John Wesley, could you? Wesley made an awful lot of money. Do you know what he did with it? He built orphanages and churches. He printed Bibles and hymn books. There was no time wasted in his life. He was methodical and systematic. Every morning at four o'clock, Wesley had an appointment with God. He disciplines his life. He disciplined his body. He'll stand at the Judgment Seat of Christ - an awesome prospect for any of us. "We ought to live every day as though we've come out of another world into this world - but with the power of that world still upon us. We should live and speak and move in that power, and have our whole being in Jesus Christ!.
The Fragrance of Worship
I heard the story for years, about the woman who came to Jesus with an alabaster box of ointment, before I understood it - before I realized that she came for one reason only. She came to worship Jesus. How do I know? Because she brought that most sacrificial gift she had and because she never said a word while she was there. How do I know? Because she didn't wash His feet with water, but with her tears. She didn't dry His feet with a towel, but she dried His feet with the hair of her head. And she poured out that costly fragrance and then wiped His feet. So what happened? The fragrance she poured out on Him came back on her!
Do you wonder why your life isn't more fragrant? It's because you don't take time to be holy. You don't take time to be with Jesus. Because you think all the knowledge you get at Bible school is enough. Oh no, God isn't going to measure your intellect. He's going to try your life with His fire. Did you get up this morning and thank God you were pure? Did you thank Him that He broke that devilish fever you used to have for sniffing cocaine or something? Are you really glad you're not a prostitute anymore, but now you're a part of the Bride of the Lamb instead? Are you glad He removed your bad temper and all those creepy horrible things that used to master you?
I think again of a statement A. W. Tozer made to me once. He said "Len, you know, we'll hardly get our feet out of time into eternity that we'll bow our heads in shame and humiliation. We'll gaze on eternity and say, "Look at all the riches there were in Jesus Christ, and I've come to the Judgment Seat almost a pauper." For God had not only given us Jesus Christ - He has with Him freely given us all things (Romans 8:32).
A Different People
As Christians, we are part of GOD'S ROYAL FAMILY, and it should be evident to all that we meet that we are a different type of people. If we can't live as a different people on this earth, we've no right to live here. We shouldn't be affected by changing customs or changing styles or changing opinions, or whether the stock market goes up or down, or whether the clouds are gathering for war. Those things don't make any difference. We ought to live every day as thous we've come out of another world into this world - but with the power of that would still upon us. We should live and speak and move in that power, and have our whole being in Jesus Christ!
Baptism Of Obedience
That final day is going to be awesome. Have you figured how you'll get on when you stand there? You and I will stand there alone on that day and be judged for every aspect of our lives - for our praying, our giving, our talking, and our doing. I still believe in the majesty of that eternal court, with the King of kings and the Lord of lords and the Judge of judges. You see, there's no possibility of any rehearsal, and what's more, there's no possibility of any repetition. Because, again, this is the Final Judgment, and to some God will say, "Come, ye blessed," but to others He'll say, "Depart from Me." No, it's not so simple to be a Christian after all. It's a majestic thing.
There's no burden too heavy, or no situation too hard for the one that you love. If we are love-controlled, love-motivated, and love-energized, it will be all right when we stand up there, because if there's anything about love - it's obedient. We need to become a people who are baptized with obedience. We need to be submissive to the total will of God, not concerned about human opinion, and not asking for more to spend on ourselves. We need to say, "Oh God, I want this life of mine to glorify You, so that when I stand in Your awesome presence, as John says, I shall not be ashamed at Your appearing" (1 John 2:28).
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(The End)
Saturday, September 29, 2018
The Judgment Seat of Christ # 3
The Judgment Seat of Christ # 3
Great Men of Prayer
You'll discover this: The men that have been the most heroic for God have been the men with the greatest devotional life. America has produced some of the greatest prayer warriors in the world. John Hyde was one of them. I knew someone who had prayed with him, and they said it was just awesome when this man went into prayer. There's a little book out on him called "Praying Hyde" that would be well worth your reading.
Edward Payson, better known as praying Payson of Portland, was another great prayer warrior. He used to kneel at the side of his bed and pray, and pray, and pray. When they washed his body for burial, they found great big bags on his knees like a camel has. Tradition says that James had camel's knees, but it's a living fact that Payson had them. When they were washing him, somebody said, "What abnormal knees. They're heavy with callouses. That's because he used to pray at the side of his bed with energy - and he wore two grooves about six or seven inches long into that hard floor where he used to pray and make intercession.
One day I was in the Bible school of Wales and there was dear Mrs. Rees Howells. (Her husband was dead now.) We stood on the terrace and she turned and said, "Do you see the room there?" I said, "Yes, I see that room." That door?" Yes." "Daddy (meaning her husband) went through that door at six o'clock in the morning and he stayed there until six o'clock at night every day for 11 months except the one day that his mother died."
Let's preview eternity and look at all the apostles and all the saints of all the ages. Look, there's Charles Finney with his amazing revivals. There's William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army. There's John Wesley. Here are all the great heroic figures we all read about, and they are all watching while the book is handed down and somebody's going to read the record. Would you volunteer and say, "Well, I'll be happy to read my record to this multitude"?
Suppose I say, "Gabriel, hand me the record for the year 1724." When I open the book to that year and go to the "B's", I find the name, David Brainerd. He was a young American who died at the age of 28. All he possessed was a cowhide that he wore with a rope tied around it. He used to ride over the Susquehanna River to follow the Indians. David had a severe case of tuberculosis and only weighed about 95 pounds. I remember reading his diary once. He said, "I got up this morning and the Indians were still committing adultery and drinking and beating their tom-toms and shouting like hell itself. I prayed from a half hour after sunrise to a half hour before sunset. There was nowhere to pray in the Indian camp. I went into the woods and knelt in the snow. It was up to my chin." No, he didn't have a heater with him or anything else. He was just there in the frigid snow, tuberculosis and all. He continued, "I wrestled in prayer until a half hour before sunset, and I could only touch the snow with the tips of my fingers. The heat of my body had melted the snow." What amazing intercessory prayer!
Well, God pity us. We can't even get people into our churches to pray, and we have velvet cushions on the seats and nice stuff on the floor so our darling little knees won't get hurt. David Brainerd, Praying Payson of Portland, John Hyde, and Rees Howells - when God puts the fire to their devotional life, I don't think there will be anything lost. It won't be wood, it won't be hay, and it won't be stubble.
True Joy
I am embarrassed to be part of the Church today because I believe it's an embarrassment to a holy God. Most of our joy is clapping our hands and having a good time and then afterwards we talk all the nonsense of the world. We're overboard on laughter and happiness. There's an old saying in the world, "Laugh and the world laughs with you." I change it and say, "Laugh and the Church laughs with you, but weep and you weep alone!" Because there isn't enough real joy in the house of God, we need entertainment. Entertainment is the devil's substitute for joy. Because there isn't enough power in the house of God, people are always looking for something to take its place. We point the finger at the world, but we need to turn to the Church and say we'd better all get sackcloth and ashes and humble ourselves and say "Almighty God!" When I see the Church in the New Testament, they didn't have stately buildings or paid evangelists or a lot of money. (They couldn't get on television and beg!) But I'll tell you what they did - they turned the world upside down!
Have you ever seen the little plaque that reads, "Only one life, 'till soon be past, only what's done for Christ will last?" Well, that's not what the poet wrote. "Only one life, 'twill soon be past, only what's done for Christ will last. And when I am dying, how happy I'll be, if the lamp of my life has been burned out for Thee." Do you, think all Christians die happy? Not on your life! Some of them die as miserable as sinners. Why? Because they've misused their time and wasted their lives. Many of you have laid dying on a hospital bed and prayed, "Lord, if You would only spare me, I'll do this, that, or the other." Well, have you done it???
I discovered this poem the other day and I want to share it with you.
His Plan For Me
When I stand at the Judgment Seat of Christ
And He shows His plan for me,
The plan of my life as it might have been
Had He had His way - and I see
How I blocked Him here, and checked Him there,
And I would not yield my will,
Will there be grief in my Saviour's eyes,
Grief though He loves me still?
Would He have me rich and I stand there poor,
Stripped of all but His grace,
While memory runs like a hunted thing,
Down the paths I cannot retrace.
Lord, of the years that are left to me
I give them to Thy hand
Take me and break me and mold me,
To the pattern that Thou hast planned!
Author unknown
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(continued with # 4)
Great Men of Prayer
You'll discover this: The men that have been the most heroic for God have been the men with the greatest devotional life. America has produced some of the greatest prayer warriors in the world. John Hyde was one of them. I knew someone who had prayed with him, and they said it was just awesome when this man went into prayer. There's a little book out on him called "Praying Hyde" that would be well worth your reading.
Edward Payson, better known as praying Payson of Portland, was another great prayer warrior. He used to kneel at the side of his bed and pray, and pray, and pray. When they washed his body for burial, they found great big bags on his knees like a camel has. Tradition says that James had camel's knees, but it's a living fact that Payson had them. When they were washing him, somebody said, "What abnormal knees. They're heavy with callouses. That's because he used to pray at the side of his bed with energy - and he wore two grooves about six or seven inches long into that hard floor where he used to pray and make intercession.
One day I was in the Bible school of Wales and there was dear Mrs. Rees Howells. (Her husband was dead now.) We stood on the terrace and she turned and said, "Do you see the room there?" I said, "Yes, I see that room." That door?" Yes." "Daddy (meaning her husband) went through that door at six o'clock in the morning and he stayed there until six o'clock at night every day for 11 months except the one day that his mother died."
Let's preview eternity and look at all the apostles and all the saints of all the ages. Look, there's Charles Finney with his amazing revivals. There's William Booth, the founder of the Salvation Army. There's John Wesley. Here are all the great heroic figures we all read about, and they are all watching while the book is handed down and somebody's going to read the record. Would you volunteer and say, "Well, I'll be happy to read my record to this multitude"?
Suppose I say, "Gabriel, hand me the record for the year 1724." When I open the book to that year and go to the "B's", I find the name, David Brainerd. He was a young American who died at the age of 28. All he possessed was a cowhide that he wore with a rope tied around it. He used to ride over the Susquehanna River to follow the Indians. David had a severe case of tuberculosis and only weighed about 95 pounds. I remember reading his diary once. He said, "I got up this morning and the Indians were still committing adultery and drinking and beating their tom-toms and shouting like hell itself. I prayed from a half hour after sunrise to a half hour before sunset. There was nowhere to pray in the Indian camp. I went into the woods and knelt in the snow. It was up to my chin." No, he didn't have a heater with him or anything else. He was just there in the frigid snow, tuberculosis and all. He continued, "I wrestled in prayer until a half hour before sunset, and I could only touch the snow with the tips of my fingers. The heat of my body had melted the snow." What amazing intercessory prayer!
Well, God pity us. We can't even get people into our churches to pray, and we have velvet cushions on the seats and nice stuff on the floor so our darling little knees won't get hurt. David Brainerd, Praying Payson of Portland, John Hyde, and Rees Howells - when God puts the fire to their devotional life, I don't think there will be anything lost. It won't be wood, it won't be hay, and it won't be stubble.
True Joy
I am embarrassed to be part of the Church today because I believe it's an embarrassment to a holy God. Most of our joy is clapping our hands and having a good time and then afterwards we talk all the nonsense of the world. We're overboard on laughter and happiness. There's an old saying in the world, "Laugh and the world laughs with you." I change it and say, "Laugh and the Church laughs with you, but weep and you weep alone!" Because there isn't enough real joy in the house of God, we need entertainment. Entertainment is the devil's substitute for joy. Because there isn't enough power in the house of God, people are always looking for something to take its place. We point the finger at the world, but we need to turn to the Church and say we'd better all get sackcloth and ashes and humble ourselves and say "Almighty God!" When I see the Church in the New Testament, they didn't have stately buildings or paid evangelists or a lot of money. (They couldn't get on television and beg!) But I'll tell you what they did - they turned the world upside down!
Have you ever seen the little plaque that reads, "Only one life, 'till soon be past, only what's done for Christ will last?" Well, that's not what the poet wrote. "Only one life, 'twill soon be past, only what's done for Christ will last. And when I am dying, how happy I'll be, if the lamp of my life has been burned out for Thee." Do you, think all Christians die happy? Not on your life! Some of them die as miserable as sinners. Why? Because they've misused their time and wasted their lives. Many of you have laid dying on a hospital bed and prayed, "Lord, if You would only spare me, I'll do this, that, or the other." Well, have you done it???
I discovered this poem the other day and I want to share it with you.
His Plan For Me
When I stand at the Judgment Seat of Christ
And He shows His plan for me,
The plan of my life as it might have been
Had He had His way - and I see
How I blocked Him here, and checked Him there,
And I would not yield my will,
Will there be grief in my Saviour's eyes,
Grief though He loves me still?
Would He have me rich and I stand there poor,
Stripped of all but His grace,
While memory runs like a hunted thing,
Down the paths I cannot retrace.
Lord, of the years that are left to me
I give them to Thy hand
Take me and break me and mold me,
To the pattern that Thou hast planned!
Author unknown
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(continued with # 4)
Saturday, September 22, 2018
The Judgment Seat of Christ # 2
The Judgment Seat of Christ # 2
All the saints of all the ages are going to be there. There's another old hymn and probably not very many of you could recite it, but I'll bet most of you know the chorus: "Oh, when the saints go marching in." You know, they dance to that every night down in New Orleans. They shuffle their feet along Bourbon Street and have a great time, but that song is not for them, it's for the REDEEMED. It says, "When the saints go marching in." The saints will march into heaven in a multitude which no man can number.
I can't wait to see all the saints of all the ages. Man, I'll be thrilled to look at Isaiah and Jeremiah and those major and minor prophets. We'll be looking around and saying, "Hey, there's Abraham. I didn't think he'd look quite like that." But he's going to be there, all right. And just think of seeing Matthew and Mark and Luke and John and everybody in Acts. Won't it be wonderful to see those men who walked with Jesus!
Let's think about Paul for a moment. He gave his intellect to God. He wrote about 14 epistles and traveled all over Asia Minor. He was lashed at the post 195 times. He was in weariness, and fastings, and pain, and tribulation, and distress, and famine, and nakedness. He was subjected to false brethren an to perils of the deep. What do you think his reward is going to be for living a life like that? GRACE is free, but REWARDS are NOT free. You might say, "But you're talking about works." Sure I am - because God did. Jesus did!!
Costly Stones
Silver, gold, precious stones. What are the precious stones? When I read that, I think of the breastplate that was on the priests in the Old Testament. It was divided by four rows of stones - three stones in each row. Each stone was different. Each stone stood for the name of one of the 12 tribes of Israel. The priest wore the breastplate over his heart as he went into the Holy Place to pray for the sins of the people. How do you handle this? Do you enter the holiest place of all to make intercession for the sins of the people? Do you enter into intercession at all? This is only possible through the blood of Christ and the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
Intercession is our job now. We don't need to send a priest into the Holy of Holies. We can go ourselves! The New Testament tells us that we are all priests - that we are a part of the Royal Priesthood (1 Peter 2:9). Do you wonder why the world is poor and sick outside? Because we really don't know how to pray, that's why! Because we're satisfied that we've left our lousy living and we don't drink or lust or damn ourselves every day. We're Christians now - and we're so content and so happy and so satisfied!
Silver
The silver...what is silver? I guess you can interpret it in different ways. But I like to think of the scripture in the book of Proverbs that says, "the tongue of the righteous is as choice silver" (Prov. 10:20). I believe that the silver may signify the words that we speak. I believe that God has an eternal record of every word we have spoken since we've been saved. That may be embarrassing. Oh, we won't be ashamed of the good things we've said, but what about our idle words? You know, gossip, slander, criticism, the prejudice. What about the time when somebody upset you and instead of being quiet, you just spilled out everything that was on your heart at that moment? And can you think of all the awesome words we've preached to thousands of people over the years? We're going to answer for every word - and the fire is going to be put to them. Will they be wood, hay, or stubble - or will they abide the fire?
Gold
What is gold a sign of? I believe it's a sign of our devotion to God. If I could have a small melting pot here, I'd put your #10,000 worth of gold in it and melt it down. What happens when you burn gold? Nothing! It just changes from solid to liquid, but you don't reduce it. Can you see all the saints standing in heaven? And there's Leonard Ravenhill - standing before Christ whose eyes are filled with holiness. The whole place is breathing holiness. There in the presence and the majesty of an awesome God, the record of my poor life is read before all the saints of all the ages. And He puts the fire to my devotional life. Am I just a good showman? I sure like to preach because God called me to preach. I don't care how I preach, and I don't care whether you believe me either. I'm not responsible for that. I preach out of my heart all I believe, and I'd die for it. But say, am I just a showman? What's my secret life like?
I've said it many times and I'll say it again - no man is greater than his prayer life. I don't care how big his organization is. Let me live with a man awhile and share his prayer life, and I'll tell you tall I think he is, or how majestic I think he is in God. What's your devotional life like right now? Would you like Gabriel to hand down the book of your devotional life for the last month so it could be read out loud at church this Sunday? The gold is going to be tried through our devotional life.
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(continued with # 3)
All the saints of all the ages are going to be there. There's another old hymn and probably not very many of you could recite it, but I'll bet most of you know the chorus: "Oh, when the saints go marching in." You know, they dance to that every night down in New Orleans. They shuffle their feet along Bourbon Street and have a great time, but that song is not for them, it's for the REDEEMED. It says, "When the saints go marching in." The saints will march into heaven in a multitude which no man can number.
I can't wait to see all the saints of all the ages. Man, I'll be thrilled to look at Isaiah and Jeremiah and those major and minor prophets. We'll be looking around and saying, "Hey, there's Abraham. I didn't think he'd look quite like that." But he's going to be there, all right. And just think of seeing Matthew and Mark and Luke and John and everybody in Acts. Won't it be wonderful to see those men who walked with Jesus!
Let's think about Paul for a moment. He gave his intellect to God. He wrote about 14 epistles and traveled all over Asia Minor. He was lashed at the post 195 times. He was in weariness, and fastings, and pain, and tribulation, and distress, and famine, and nakedness. He was subjected to false brethren an to perils of the deep. What do you think his reward is going to be for living a life like that? GRACE is free, but REWARDS are NOT free. You might say, "But you're talking about works." Sure I am - because God did. Jesus did!!
Costly Stones
Silver, gold, precious stones. What are the precious stones? When I read that, I think of the breastplate that was on the priests in the Old Testament. It was divided by four rows of stones - three stones in each row. Each stone was different. Each stone stood for the name of one of the 12 tribes of Israel. The priest wore the breastplate over his heart as he went into the Holy Place to pray for the sins of the people. How do you handle this? Do you enter the holiest place of all to make intercession for the sins of the people? Do you enter into intercession at all? This is only possible through the blood of Christ and the anointing of the Holy Spirit.
Intercession is our job now. We don't need to send a priest into the Holy of Holies. We can go ourselves! The New Testament tells us that we are all priests - that we are a part of the Royal Priesthood (1 Peter 2:9). Do you wonder why the world is poor and sick outside? Because we really don't know how to pray, that's why! Because we're satisfied that we've left our lousy living and we don't drink or lust or damn ourselves every day. We're Christians now - and we're so content and so happy and so satisfied!
Silver
The silver...what is silver? I guess you can interpret it in different ways. But I like to think of the scripture in the book of Proverbs that says, "the tongue of the righteous is as choice silver" (Prov. 10:20). I believe that the silver may signify the words that we speak. I believe that God has an eternal record of every word we have spoken since we've been saved. That may be embarrassing. Oh, we won't be ashamed of the good things we've said, but what about our idle words? You know, gossip, slander, criticism, the prejudice. What about the time when somebody upset you and instead of being quiet, you just spilled out everything that was on your heart at that moment? And can you think of all the awesome words we've preached to thousands of people over the years? We're going to answer for every word - and the fire is going to be put to them. Will they be wood, hay, or stubble - or will they abide the fire?
Gold
What is gold a sign of? I believe it's a sign of our devotion to God. If I could have a small melting pot here, I'd put your #10,000 worth of gold in it and melt it down. What happens when you burn gold? Nothing! It just changes from solid to liquid, but you don't reduce it. Can you see all the saints standing in heaven? And there's Leonard Ravenhill - standing before Christ whose eyes are filled with holiness. The whole place is breathing holiness. There in the presence and the majesty of an awesome God, the record of my poor life is read before all the saints of all the ages. And He puts the fire to my devotional life. Am I just a good showman? I sure like to preach because God called me to preach. I don't care how I preach, and I don't care whether you believe me either. I'm not responsible for that. I preach out of my heart all I believe, and I'd die for it. But say, am I just a showman? What's my secret life like?
I've said it many times and I'll say it again - no man is greater than his prayer life. I don't care how big his organization is. Let me live with a man awhile and share his prayer life, and I'll tell you tall I think he is, or how majestic I think he is in God. What's your devotional life like right now? Would you like Gabriel to hand down the book of your devotional life for the last month so it could be read out loud at church this Sunday? The gold is going to be tried through our devotional life.
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(continued with # 3)
The Judgment Seat of Christ # 1
The Judgment Seat of Christ # 1
"For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ" (Romans 14:10).
I want to tell you a story about when I was a young boy going to school. You know, I didn't mind school too much, but in those days I was very envious of the school Captain. His name was Renton, and he sat just sat across the aisle from me. He was the best soccer player in the school and that's what I wanted to be. He was the best at cricket, and I liked cricket. He was the best runner we had, and I liked running. He was not only an excellent athlete, but a very good artist as well. And on top of all that, he was the smartest guy in the whole school.
If I could ever save up my stomachaches, I'd save them until the day before the final exam. But my mother was smart. She knew I was saving them up. I don't know how she knew, but she always did. I'd get up that morning and say, "Oh mother, I don't feel good at all. I think I should stay home today." But she'd always say, "You can stay home tomorrow - but not today." But staying home tomorrow wouldn't do me any good because today was the day of the final exam. Today was the day of judgment!
I know Renton never felt like that because whenever we had a test, as soon as the questions were put down on the board, he would get his paper and dash through them. He was through the first two or three subjects before I'd even gotten the thing read. He and another fellow used to say, "Oh boy, exams!" They knew they'd be first and second in the class when the grades came out, and so they were excited about taking the test. Final exams didn't scare them. These boys were always at the top. They were not afraid of the Day of Judgment. They were not afraid - because they were prepared for it.
Quality Not Quantity
"For we are God's fellow workers; you are God's field, God building." According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I laid a foundation, and another is building upon it. But let each man be careful how he builds upon it. "For no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. "Now if any man builds upon the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, "Each man's work will become evident; for the day will show it, because it is to be revealed with fire; and the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work" (1 Cor. 3:9-13).
The above scripture is talking about the day all believers will stand before the Lord. When every follower of Jesus will account his life and his deeds before all heaven itself. Notice what it says very carefully, "... the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work." Not how much work, but rather what kind of work. Not the quantity but the quality. This scripture is speaking of your whole life's work. This scripture is speaking of your whole life's work. In other words, your life's work can be wood, or hay or straw - or it can be silver, gold, or costly stones. And on that day, the fire will put it to the final test. What fire? The Bible tells that God is love, but it also tells us that He is a consuming fire as well. (Hebrews 12:29).
Paul continues by saying, "If any man's work which he had built upon it remains, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work is burned up, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as through fire. (1 Cor. 3:14-15). This illustration would be extremely significant to the people of Corinth that Paul was speaking to, because not too long before this was written, their whole city was devastated by fire. They all knew firsthand what damage fire could do. When the fire swept through Corinth, every house that was build out of wood, hay, or straw, was devastated and left in ashes. But the more wealthy people there had houses built with beautiful pillars of granite, and some even had houses built totally out of marble. These houses made of costly stones were standing after the fire swept through, though they were obviously very badly scorched.
Your Life Investment
Let's visualize another way. One man is given $10,000 and he invests it in wood - maybe some lovely mahogany. So this man's entire life work is made out of wood. It's very beautiful, but when the fire goes through it, what do you have? All you have is ashes, maybe up to your ankles, and that's all there is left. The next man is given $10,000 and he invests it in hay. Another man given the same amount invests all of it in straw. Does that sound foolish? Well, people do it every day. Why? Because if you put $10,000 into hay or straw, it looks like you are getting a lot for your money. You could probably but half the straw in Texas for $10,000, but, boy, you're going to have a mess when the fire gets to it. Instead of ashes to your ankles, or ashes to your knees, it'll be up to your nose maybe. But that's what some lives are going to be like: wood, hay, stubble - then ashes.
Now let's look at a few people who made much wiser investments. There's a man over here who has $10,000, and maybe he invests it in gold. (He probably won't get much at $400 an ounce, will he?). The next man invests $10,000 in silver, and another man invests the same amount in costly stones. Each of the six men I've just spoken of had the same amount of money, but they all chose different things to invest it in. Now, we are talking about your life's work. Do you get the picture? Our whole life, from the very moment we begin to witness for Christ, including all of our service and our labor for Him, is going to be tested by fire. We must be very careful to make wise investments, or in the end, all that will be left in ashes.
Eternal Value
Will our life's work stand the test of the fire when we come before the Lord? Will it have lasting eternal value - or will it end up in ashes? There's an interesting difference between wood, hay, straw - and gold, silver, and costly stones. Wood, hay, and stubble are found above the ground. They catch the eye, just like many people's ministries do. They are quite plentiful and easy to find. On the other hand, silver, gold, and precious stones are found below the ground. Nobody sees them - again, like many people's ministries. They're not just lying around in a field somewhere for anyone to pick up. They are much harder to come by; in fact it takes a lot of hard work to get them. That's why they are so expensive. They are of much higher quality than many other things, and much more rare too. Again, it's the quality, not the quantity that sets their value. Many things are difficult in the Christian life, but we should desire to acquire those things which will hold their value, not only on earth, but in heaven as well.
Ministry and Money
Every person's life, including all of his ministry, is going to pass through the fire. There's a lot of public ministry that's going to go down in flame on that day, my brothers. The fire is going to take the big showy life of every man and burn it until only a bunch of ashes is left. I'm tired of seeing these fellows begging for money on television. I believe every dime that comes into any ministry will need to be answered for before the Judgment Seat of Christ one day. Jesus talked about these men who'd go and take widows houses. (Luke 20:46-47). Well, that's what many are doing now. And they're not satisfied that you give while you're living, they ask you to hand over your house and all the rest to them in your will. They're going to give an account to God in that day, but, I believe we're also going to give an account.
A brother was telling me this week that when he got baptized and went down into the water, he suddenly realized that he had his wallet in his pocket. Not many wallets get baptized! We kind of say, "Lord, You look after my sins, I'll look after the rest." You'll give an account to God for every penny you're earned since you became the property of Jesus Christ. He doesn't just take your sins - He takes all of you.
Oh yes, many may want to get filled with the Holy Spirit and get a bank balance, but how many of you are big enough to say, "Lord, in this crucial hour in human history, let me fill up with the sufferings of Christ? Can He share His sorrow with you? Are you prepared to challenge demon power and say, "Listen, I've moved into the place where the Apostle Paul was when he said, "I glory in tribulations and necessities and reproaches"? Watch out though, because if you're going to get mature in God, all the dwarfs around you will criticize you and sneer at you and say, "Trying to be holier than the rest of us, huh? So you don't have time for basketball or going to see a baseball game?" No, maybe you don't, but that's nobody's business but yours and God's!!
Do you get so near to the heart of God that you share His grief over the world and over the back-slidden church that we have today? One of the most famous preachers in the country recently called at nearly midnight and said, "I've come to this conclusion: God Almighty has already taken His hand off America - for the simple reason that we've had so much light and we're rejected it!" It's not only true that we live in a world of bankrupt politics, we live in a world (this is the most tragic part of all) of a bankrupt church!
Will Christians Be Judged?
I heard a woman say not long ago, "Well, praise the Lord. I'm glad I don't have to account for anything when I go to heaven. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." Wait at minute, you can never isolate a scripture by itself. There's no condemnation for our past sins, and I'm sure we are all mighty glad of that. But God was always saying to Israel, "Remember when thou wast a bondsman in Egypt...remember your sin...remember your iniquity."
You might say, "It doesn't say the Christians are going to be judged out of the books." Yes, I think it does! Where? In Malachi 3:16. It says that God has a Book of Remembrance, and I think it would do you good before you go to bed every night this week to ask God, "What did You put in Your book today for my life?" It doesn't have to be some outward act. You can worship God on a tractor [I agree!] It may not be the best way, but you can do it.
The Bible says that "we shall all stand before the Judgment Seat of Christ" (Romans 14:10). I think that scripture means just what it says!
The Holy Dead
A hymn writer says, "From earth's wide bounds and ocean's farthest coast, through gates of pearl, stream in a countless host, singing Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Hallelujah!!"
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(continued with # 2)
"For we shall all stand before the judgment seat of Christ" (Romans 14:10).
I want to tell you a story about when I was a young boy going to school. You know, I didn't mind school too much, but in those days I was very envious of the school Captain. His name was Renton, and he sat just sat across the aisle from me. He was the best soccer player in the school and that's what I wanted to be. He was the best at cricket, and I liked cricket. He was the best runner we had, and I liked running. He was not only an excellent athlete, but a very good artist as well. And on top of all that, he was the smartest guy in the whole school.
If I could ever save up my stomachaches, I'd save them until the day before the final exam. But my mother was smart. She knew I was saving them up. I don't know how she knew, but she always did. I'd get up that morning and say, "Oh mother, I don't feel good at all. I think I should stay home today." But she'd always say, "You can stay home tomorrow - but not today." But staying home tomorrow wouldn't do me any good because today was the day of the final exam. Today was the day of judgment!
I know Renton never felt like that because whenever we had a test, as soon as the questions were put down on the board, he would get his paper and dash through them. He was through the first two or three subjects before I'd even gotten the thing read. He and another fellow used to say, "Oh boy, exams!" They knew they'd be first and second in the class when the grades came out, and so they were excited about taking the test. Final exams didn't scare them. These boys were always at the top. They were not afraid of the Day of Judgment. They were not afraid - because they were prepared for it.
Quality Not Quantity
"For we are God's fellow workers; you are God's field, God building." According to the grace of God which was given to me, as a wise master builder I laid a foundation, and another is building upon it. But let each man be careful how he builds upon it. "For no man can lay a foundation other than the one which is laid, which is Jesus Christ. "Now if any man builds upon the foundation with gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, straw, "Each man's work will become evident; for the day will show it, because it is to be revealed with fire; and the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work" (1 Cor. 3:9-13).
The above scripture is talking about the day all believers will stand before the Lord. When every follower of Jesus will account his life and his deeds before all heaven itself. Notice what it says very carefully, "... the fire itself will test the quality of each man's work." Not how much work, but rather what kind of work. Not the quantity but the quality. This scripture is speaking of your whole life's work. This scripture is speaking of your whole life's work. In other words, your life's work can be wood, or hay or straw - or it can be silver, gold, or costly stones. And on that day, the fire will put it to the final test. What fire? The Bible tells that God is love, but it also tells us that He is a consuming fire as well. (Hebrews 12:29).
Paul continues by saying, "If any man's work which he had built upon it remains, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work is burned up, he shall suffer loss; but he himself shall be saved, yet so as through fire. (1 Cor. 3:14-15). This illustration would be extremely significant to the people of Corinth that Paul was speaking to, because not too long before this was written, their whole city was devastated by fire. They all knew firsthand what damage fire could do. When the fire swept through Corinth, every house that was build out of wood, hay, or straw, was devastated and left in ashes. But the more wealthy people there had houses built with beautiful pillars of granite, and some even had houses built totally out of marble. These houses made of costly stones were standing after the fire swept through, though they were obviously very badly scorched.
Your Life Investment
Let's visualize another way. One man is given $10,000 and he invests it in wood - maybe some lovely mahogany. So this man's entire life work is made out of wood. It's very beautiful, but when the fire goes through it, what do you have? All you have is ashes, maybe up to your ankles, and that's all there is left. The next man is given $10,000 and he invests it in hay. Another man given the same amount invests all of it in straw. Does that sound foolish? Well, people do it every day. Why? Because if you put $10,000 into hay or straw, it looks like you are getting a lot for your money. You could probably but half the straw in Texas for $10,000, but, boy, you're going to have a mess when the fire gets to it. Instead of ashes to your ankles, or ashes to your knees, it'll be up to your nose maybe. But that's what some lives are going to be like: wood, hay, stubble - then ashes.
Now let's look at a few people who made much wiser investments. There's a man over here who has $10,000, and maybe he invests it in gold. (He probably won't get much at $400 an ounce, will he?). The next man invests $10,000 in silver, and another man invests the same amount in costly stones. Each of the six men I've just spoken of had the same amount of money, but they all chose different things to invest it in. Now, we are talking about your life's work. Do you get the picture? Our whole life, from the very moment we begin to witness for Christ, including all of our service and our labor for Him, is going to be tested by fire. We must be very careful to make wise investments, or in the end, all that will be left in ashes.
Eternal Value
Will our life's work stand the test of the fire when we come before the Lord? Will it have lasting eternal value - or will it end up in ashes? There's an interesting difference between wood, hay, straw - and gold, silver, and costly stones. Wood, hay, and stubble are found above the ground. They catch the eye, just like many people's ministries do. They are quite plentiful and easy to find. On the other hand, silver, gold, and precious stones are found below the ground. Nobody sees them - again, like many people's ministries. They're not just lying around in a field somewhere for anyone to pick up. They are much harder to come by; in fact it takes a lot of hard work to get them. That's why they are so expensive. They are of much higher quality than many other things, and much more rare too. Again, it's the quality, not the quantity that sets their value. Many things are difficult in the Christian life, but we should desire to acquire those things which will hold their value, not only on earth, but in heaven as well.
Ministry and Money
Every person's life, including all of his ministry, is going to pass through the fire. There's a lot of public ministry that's going to go down in flame on that day, my brothers. The fire is going to take the big showy life of every man and burn it until only a bunch of ashes is left. I'm tired of seeing these fellows begging for money on television. I believe every dime that comes into any ministry will need to be answered for before the Judgment Seat of Christ one day. Jesus talked about these men who'd go and take widows houses. (Luke 20:46-47). Well, that's what many are doing now. And they're not satisfied that you give while you're living, they ask you to hand over your house and all the rest to them in your will. They're going to give an account to God in that day, but, I believe we're also going to give an account.
A brother was telling me this week that when he got baptized and went down into the water, he suddenly realized that he had his wallet in his pocket. Not many wallets get baptized! We kind of say, "Lord, You look after my sins, I'll look after the rest." You'll give an account to God for every penny you're earned since you became the property of Jesus Christ. He doesn't just take your sins - He takes all of you.
Oh yes, many may want to get filled with the Holy Spirit and get a bank balance, but how many of you are big enough to say, "Lord, in this crucial hour in human history, let me fill up with the sufferings of Christ? Can He share His sorrow with you? Are you prepared to challenge demon power and say, "Listen, I've moved into the place where the Apostle Paul was when he said, "I glory in tribulations and necessities and reproaches"? Watch out though, because if you're going to get mature in God, all the dwarfs around you will criticize you and sneer at you and say, "Trying to be holier than the rest of us, huh? So you don't have time for basketball or going to see a baseball game?" No, maybe you don't, but that's nobody's business but yours and God's!!
Do you get so near to the heart of God that you share His grief over the world and over the back-slidden church that we have today? One of the most famous preachers in the country recently called at nearly midnight and said, "I've come to this conclusion: God Almighty has already taken His hand off America - for the simple reason that we've had so much light and we're rejected it!" It's not only true that we live in a world of bankrupt politics, we live in a world (this is the most tragic part of all) of a bankrupt church!
Will Christians Be Judged?
I heard a woman say not long ago, "Well, praise the Lord. I'm glad I don't have to account for anything when I go to heaven. There is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." Wait at minute, you can never isolate a scripture by itself. There's no condemnation for our past sins, and I'm sure we are all mighty glad of that. But God was always saying to Israel, "Remember when thou wast a bondsman in Egypt...remember your sin...remember your iniquity."
You might say, "It doesn't say the Christians are going to be judged out of the books." Yes, I think it does! Where? In Malachi 3:16. It says that God has a Book of Remembrance, and I think it would do you good before you go to bed every night this week to ask God, "What did You put in Your book today for my life?" It doesn't have to be some outward act. You can worship God on a tractor [I agree!] It may not be the best way, but you can do it.
The Bible says that "we shall all stand before the Judgment Seat of Christ" (Romans 14:10). I think that scripture means just what it says!
The Holy Dead
A hymn writer says, "From earth's wide bounds and ocean's farthest coast, through gates of pearl, stream in a countless host, singing Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, Hallelujah!!"
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(continued with # 2)
Time Is Short!
Time Is Short!
"What I mean, brothers, is that the time is short. From now on those who have wives, should live as if they had none, those who mourn, as if they did not; those who are happy, as if they were not; those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away" (1 Corinthians 7:29-31).
In these words there is:
1. A statement made: "The time is short," and again: "This world in its present form is passing away!" The time to be spent in this world is very short; it is but an inch of time - a short half-hour. In a very little while, it will be all over. All that is here, is changing - the very hills are crumbling down - the loveliest face is withering away - the finest garments rot and decay! "This world in its present form is passing away."
2. A lesson drawn from this: Believers should sit loose to everything here on earth. Believers should look on everything in the light of eternity. Value nothing any more than you will do then. Sit loose to the objects, griefs, joys, occupations of this world - for you must soon change them for eternal realities!
DOCTRINE. The shortness of time should make believers sit loose to all things under the sun.
1. The shortness of time. This is true in two respects.
2. The time a believer has to live in this world is very short.
A. The whole lifetime is very short. From the cradle to the grave is but a short journey: "The length of our days is seventy years - o"r eighty, if we have the strength; yet their span is but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away!" (Psalm 90:10).
The half of men die before the age of twenty. Even when men lived for many hundred years, it was but a short life - a moment compared to eternity. Methuselah lived nine hundred and sixty-nine years, and he died. "All flesh is as grass," and "the grass withers, the flower fades; because the Spirit of the Lord blows upon it." (Isaiah 40:7). "For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appears for a little time, and then vanishes away!" (James 4:14).
B. Much of our time is already passed away. Most believers spent their first days in the service of sin.
C. The time of this world's continuance is short. "The end of all things is at hand." A little while, brethren, and the day of grace will be over - preaching, praying will be done. Soon we will give over wrestling with an unbelieving world - soon the number of believers shall be complete, and the sky open over our heads, and Christ shall come! Then we shall see Him "whom having not seen, we loved." A little while, and we shall stand before the great white throne. A little while, and the wicked shall not be - we shall see them going away into everlasting punishment. A little while and the work of eternity will be begin. We shall be like Him - we shall see Him day and night in His temple - we shall sing the new song, without sin and without weariness forever and ever. In a little moment, brethren, all this shall be reality!
2. The believer should learn from this, to sit loose to all things under the sun.
A. Sit loose to the DEAREST objects of this world. "From now on those who have wives, should live as if they had none." Marriage is honorable in all. Husbands should love their wives, even as Christ loved the Church. "So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies." Still it must not be idolatry. A married believer should be, in some respects, as if he were unmarried.
"Honor your father and mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God gives you." You cannot be too kind, too gentle, too loving, to the parents whom God has given you - yet be as though you had none. Parents, love your children, and bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord - yet feel that the time is short. They are only a loan from the Lord. Be not surprised if He takes them. Esteem your ministers highly in love, for their work's sake - yet be as if you had none. Lean as entirely on Christ as if you had never seen or heard a minister.
Brainerd mentions an instance of one woman, who, after conversion, was resigned to the divine will in the most tender points: "What if God should take away your husband from you - how do you think you would bear that?" Se replied: "He belongs to God, and not to me. He may do with him just what He pleases." When she longed to die, to be free from sin, she was asked what would become of her infant; she answered, "God will take care of it; it belongs to Him - He will take care of it."
Rutherford says: "Do not build your nest upon any earthly tree; for God has sold the forest to death, and every tree whereon we would build, is ready to be cut down, to the end we may flee and mount up, and build upon the Rock, and dwell in the cleft of the Rock."
2. Sit loose to the GRIEFS of this world. "Those who mourn, as if they did not." This world is the valley of tears. There are always mourning. No sooner is the tear dried up on one check - that it trickles down another. Those who are in Christ should weep as though they wept not, "for the time is short." Do you weep over those who died in the Lord? It is right to weep: "Jesus wept." They are not lost, but gone before. The sun, when it sets, is not lost; it is gone to shine in another hemisphere. Just so, have believers gone to shine in a brighter world. It is self-love that makes you mourn for them; for they are blissfully happy. Why do you mourn for them when they are with the sinner's Friend? "They shall hunger no mare, neither thirst any more, neither shall the sun light upon them, nor the heat; for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto fountains of living waters; and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes!"
Do you weep over those that died out of the Lord? Ah! there is deeper cause for weeping here - and yet the time is short, when all this will be explained to you, and you will not be able to shed a tear over the lost. A little while, and you will see Jesus fully glorified, and you will not be able to wish anything different from what has happened. When Aaron lost his two sons, he remained silent. When we get to the presence of Jesus, all our griefs shall look like children's griefs! A day in His presence will make you remember your miseries no more. Therefore, take courage, and run with patience.
3. Sit loose to the ENJOYMENTS of this world. It is quite right for a believer to use the things of this world, and to rejoice in them. Still, he should "rejoice as though he rejoiced not, and use this world as not abusing it;" for "the time is short." In a little while you will be at your Father's table above, drinking the new wine with Christ! You will meet with all your brothers and sisters in Christ. You will have pure joy in God through ceaseless ages! Do not be much taken with the fleeting joys of this poor world.
4. Sit loose to the OCCUPATIONS of the world. It is right for Christians to be diligent in business. I often wonder how unconverted souls can be so busy - how, when you are bustling along, filling up all your time with worldly things, it never occurs to you that there will be none of this in eternity. How can I be so busy for my "body", when my poor soul is unprovided for? But those in Christ may well be diligent. They have a good conscience, and they love their Lord!
C. What the UNCONVERTED should learn from the shortness of time. Learn your folly in having lost the past. God has given you time to save your soul - and you have spent it in ruining your soul. God gave you time to flee to Christ - and you have spent it in fleeing toward hell! Oh! brethren, be wise. "Why do you stand idle all the day?" Your unconverted head is grey - your feet are tottering. You are condemned already - your days are numbered - you are hanging by a thread over the mouth of hell! And yet you are cutting and slashing at the hand that holds you! In a little moment it will be all over. Throughout the never-ending ages of eternity, you will remember the few days we spent together. Ah! the remembrance will add fuel to the flame, and be a never-dying worm in you poor soul!
~Robert Murray M'Cheyne~
(The End)
"What I mean, brothers, is that the time is short. From now on those who have wives, should live as if they had none, those who mourn, as if they did not; those who are happy, as if they were not; those who buy something, as if it were not theirs to keep; those who use the things of the world, as if not engrossed in them. For this world in its present form is passing away" (1 Corinthians 7:29-31).
In these words there is:
1. A statement made: "The time is short," and again: "This world in its present form is passing away!" The time to be spent in this world is very short; it is but an inch of time - a short half-hour. In a very little while, it will be all over. All that is here, is changing - the very hills are crumbling down - the loveliest face is withering away - the finest garments rot and decay! "This world in its present form is passing away."
2. A lesson drawn from this: Believers should sit loose to everything here on earth. Believers should look on everything in the light of eternity. Value nothing any more than you will do then. Sit loose to the objects, griefs, joys, occupations of this world - for you must soon change them for eternal realities!
DOCTRINE. The shortness of time should make believers sit loose to all things under the sun.
1. The shortness of time. This is true in two respects.
2. The time a believer has to live in this world is very short.
A. The whole lifetime is very short. From the cradle to the grave is but a short journey: "The length of our days is seventy years - o"r eighty, if we have the strength; yet their span is but trouble and sorrow, for they quickly pass, and we fly away!" (Psalm 90:10).
The half of men die before the age of twenty. Even when men lived for many hundred years, it was but a short life - a moment compared to eternity. Methuselah lived nine hundred and sixty-nine years, and he died. "All flesh is as grass," and "the grass withers, the flower fades; because the Spirit of the Lord blows upon it." (Isaiah 40:7). "For what is your life? It is even a vapor, that appears for a little time, and then vanishes away!" (James 4:14).
B. Much of our time is already passed away. Most believers spent their first days in the service of sin.
C. The time of this world's continuance is short. "The end of all things is at hand." A little while, brethren, and the day of grace will be over - preaching, praying will be done. Soon we will give over wrestling with an unbelieving world - soon the number of believers shall be complete, and the sky open over our heads, and Christ shall come! Then we shall see Him "whom having not seen, we loved." A little while, and we shall stand before the great white throne. A little while, and the wicked shall not be - we shall see them going away into everlasting punishment. A little while and the work of eternity will be begin. We shall be like Him - we shall see Him day and night in His temple - we shall sing the new song, without sin and without weariness forever and ever. In a little moment, brethren, all this shall be reality!
2. The believer should learn from this, to sit loose to all things under the sun.
A. Sit loose to the DEAREST objects of this world. "From now on those who have wives, should live as if they had none." Marriage is honorable in all. Husbands should love their wives, even as Christ loved the Church. "So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies." Still it must not be idolatry. A married believer should be, in some respects, as if he were unmarried.
"Honor your father and mother, that your days may be long upon the land which the Lord your God gives you." You cannot be too kind, too gentle, too loving, to the parents whom God has given you - yet be as though you had none. Parents, love your children, and bring them up in the nurture and admonition of the Lord - yet feel that the time is short. They are only a loan from the Lord. Be not surprised if He takes them. Esteem your ministers highly in love, for their work's sake - yet be as if you had none. Lean as entirely on Christ as if you had never seen or heard a minister.
Brainerd mentions an instance of one woman, who, after conversion, was resigned to the divine will in the most tender points: "What if God should take away your husband from you - how do you think you would bear that?" Se replied: "He belongs to God, and not to me. He may do with him just what He pleases." When she longed to die, to be free from sin, she was asked what would become of her infant; she answered, "God will take care of it; it belongs to Him - He will take care of it."
Rutherford says: "Do not build your nest upon any earthly tree; for God has sold the forest to death, and every tree whereon we would build, is ready to be cut down, to the end we may flee and mount up, and build upon the Rock, and dwell in the cleft of the Rock."
2. Sit loose to the GRIEFS of this world. "Those who mourn, as if they did not." This world is the valley of tears. There are always mourning. No sooner is the tear dried up on one check - that it trickles down another. Those who are in Christ should weep as though they wept not, "for the time is short." Do you weep over those who died in the Lord? It is right to weep: "Jesus wept." They are not lost, but gone before. The sun, when it sets, is not lost; it is gone to shine in another hemisphere. Just so, have believers gone to shine in a brighter world. It is self-love that makes you mourn for them; for they are blissfully happy. Why do you mourn for them when they are with the sinner's Friend? "They shall hunger no mare, neither thirst any more, neither shall the sun light upon them, nor the heat; for the Lamb who is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto fountains of living waters; and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes!"
Do you weep over those that died out of the Lord? Ah! there is deeper cause for weeping here - and yet the time is short, when all this will be explained to you, and you will not be able to shed a tear over the lost. A little while, and you will see Jesus fully glorified, and you will not be able to wish anything different from what has happened. When Aaron lost his two sons, he remained silent. When we get to the presence of Jesus, all our griefs shall look like children's griefs! A day in His presence will make you remember your miseries no more. Therefore, take courage, and run with patience.
3. Sit loose to the ENJOYMENTS of this world. It is quite right for a believer to use the things of this world, and to rejoice in them. Still, he should "rejoice as though he rejoiced not, and use this world as not abusing it;" for "the time is short." In a little while you will be at your Father's table above, drinking the new wine with Christ! You will meet with all your brothers and sisters in Christ. You will have pure joy in God through ceaseless ages! Do not be much taken with the fleeting joys of this poor world.
4. Sit loose to the OCCUPATIONS of the world. It is right for Christians to be diligent in business. I often wonder how unconverted souls can be so busy - how, when you are bustling along, filling up all your time with worldly things, it never occurs to you that there will be none of this in eternity. How can I be so busy for my "body", when my poor soul is unprovided for? But those in Christ may well be diligent. They have a good conscience, and they love their Lord!
C. What the UNCONVERTED should learn from the shortness of time. Learn your folly in having lost the past. God has given you time to save your soul - and you have spent it in ruining your soul. God gave you time to flee to Christ - and you have spent it in fleeing toward hell! Oh! brethren, be wise. "Why do you stand idle all the day?" Your unconverted head is grey - your feet are tottering. You are condemned already - your days are numbered - you are hanging by a thread over the mouth of hell! And yet you are cutting and slashing at the hand that holds you! In a little moment it will be all over. Throughout the never-ending ages of eternity, you will remember the few days we spent together. Ah! the remembrance will add fuel to the flame, and be a never-dying worm in you poor soul!
~Robert Murray M'Cheyne~
(The End)
Saturday, September 15, 2018
The Old Cross and the New
The Old Cross and the New
ALL UNANNOUNCED AND MOSTLY UNDETECTED there has come in modern times a new cross into popular evangelical circles. It is like the old Cross, but different: the likenesses are superficial; the differences, fundamental.
From this new cross has sprung a new philosophy of the Christian life, and from that new philosophy has come a new evangelical technique - a new type of meeting and a new kind of preaching. This new evangelism employs the same language as the old, but its content is not the same and its emphasis not as before.
The old Cross would have no truck with the world. For Adam's proud flesh it meant the end of the journey. It carried into effect the sentence imposed by the law of Sinai. The new cross is not opposed to the human race; rather, it is a friendly pal and, if understood right, it is the source of oceans of good clean fun and innocent enjoyment. It lets Adam live without interference. His life motivation is unchanged; he still lives for his own pleasure, only now he takes delight in singing choruses and watching religious movies instead of singing bawdy songs and drinking hard liquor. The accent is still on enjoyment, though the fun is now on a higher plane morally if not intellectually.
The new cross encourages a new and entirely different evangelistic approach. The evangelist does not demand abnegation of the old life before a new life can be received. He preaches not contrasts but similarities. He seeks to key into public interest by showing that Christianity makes no unpleasant demands; rather, it offers the same thing the world does, only on a higher level. Whatever the sin-mad world happens to be clamoring after at the moment is cleverly shown to be the very thing the gospel offers, only the religious product is better.
The new cross does not slay the sinner, it redirects him. It gears him into a cleaner and jollier way of living and saves his self-respect. To the self-assertive it says, "Come and assert yourself for Christ." To the egotist it says, "Come and do your boasting in the Lord." To the thrill seeker it says, "Come and enjoy the thrill of Christian fellowship." The Christian message is slanted in the direction of the current vogue in order to make it acceptable to the public.
The philosophy back of this kind of thing may be sincere but its sincerity does not save it from being false. It is false because it is blind. It misses completely the whole meaning of the Cross.
The old Cross is a symbol of death. It stands for the abrupt, violent end of a human being. The man in Roman times who took up his cross and started down the road had already said good-by to his friends. He was not coming back. He was going out to have it ended. The Cross made no compromise, modified nothing, spared nothing; it slew all of the man, completely and for good. It did not try to keep on good terms with its victim. It struck cruel and hard, and when it had finished its work, the man was no more.
The race of Adam is under death sentence. There is no commutation and no escape. God cannot approve any of the fruits of sin, however innocent they may appear or beautiful to the eyes of men. God salvages the individual by liquidating him and then raising him again to newness of life.
That evangelism which draws friendly parallels between the ways of God and the ways of men is false to the Bible and cruel to the souls of its hearers. The faith of Christ does not parallel the world, it intersects it. In coming to Christ we do not bring our old life up onto a higher plane; we leave it at the Cross. The corn of wheat must fall into the ground and die.
We who preach the gospel must not think of ourselves as public relations agents sent to establish good will between Christ and the world. We must not imagine ourselves commissioned to make Christ acceptable to big business, the press, the world of sports or modern education. We are not diplomats but prophets, and our message is not a compromise but an ultimatum.
God offers life, but not an improved old life. The life He offers is life out of death. It stands always on the far side of the Cross. Whoever would possess it must pass under the rod. He must repudiate himself and concur in God's just sentence against him.
What does this mean to the individual, the condemned man who would find life in Christ Jesus? How can this theology be translated into life? Simply, he must repent and believe. He must forsake his sins and then go on to forsake himself. Let him cover nothing, defend nothing, excuse nothing. Let him not seek to make terms with God, but let him bow his head before the stroke of God's stern displeasure and acknowledge himself worthy to die.
Having done this let him gaze with simple trust upon the risen Saviour, and from Him will come life and rebirth and cleansing and power. The Cross that ended the earthly life of Jesus now puts an end to the sinner; and the power that raised Christ from the dead now raises him to a new life along with Christ.
To any who may object to this or count it merely a narrow and private view of truth, let me say God has set His hallmark of approval upon this message from Paul's day to the present. Whether stated in these exact words or not, this has been the content of all preaching that has brought life and power to the world through the centuries. The mystics, the reformers, the revivalists have put their emphasis here, and signs and wonders and mighty operations of the Holy Spirit gave witness to God's approval.
Dare we, the heirs of such a legacy of power, tamper with the truth? Dare we with our stubby pencils erase the lines of the blueprint or alter the pattern shown us in the Mount? May God forbid! Let us preach the old Cross and will know the old power.
~A. W. Tozer~
(The End)
ALL UNANNOUNCED AND MOSTLY UNDETECTED there has come in modern times a new cross into popular evangelical circles. It is like the old Cross, but different: the likenesses are superficial; the differences, fundamental.
From this new cross has sprung a new philosophy of the Christian life, and from that new philosophy has come a new evangelical technique - a new type of meeting and a new kind of preaching. This new evangelism employs the same language as the old, but its content is not the same and its emphasis not as before.
The old Cross would have no truck with the world. For Adam's proud flesh it meant the end of the journey. It carried into effect the sentence imposed by the law of Sinai. The new cross is not opposed to the human race; rather, it is a friendly pal and, if understood right, it is the source of oceans of good clean fun and innocent enjoyment. It lets Adam live without interference. His life motivation is unchanged; he still lives for his own pleasure, only now he takes delight in singing choruses and watching religious movies instead of singing bawdy songs and drinking hard liquor. The accent is still on enjoyment, though the fun is now on a higher plane morally if not intellectually.
The new cross encourages a new and entirely different evangelistic approach. The evangelist does not demand abnegation of the old life before a new life can be received. He preaches not contrasts but similarities. He seeks to key into public interest by showing that Christianity makes no unpleasant demands; rather, it offers the same thing the world does, only on a higher level. Whatever the sin-mad world happens to be clamoring after at the moment is cleverly shown to be the very thing the gospel offers, only the religious product is better.
The new cross does not slay the sinner, it redirects him. It gears him into a cleaner and jollier way of living and saves his self-respect. To the self-assertive it says, "Come and assert yourself for Christ." To the egotist it says, "Come and do your boasting in the Lord." To the thrill seeker it says, "Come and enjoy the thrill of Christian fellowship." The Christian message is slanted in the direction of the current vogue in order to make it acceptable to the public.
The philosophy back of this kind of thing may be sincere but its sincerity does not save it from being false. It is false because it is blind. It misses completely the whole meaning of the Cross.
The old Cross is a symbol of death. It stands for the abrupt, violent end of a human being. The man in Roman times who took up his cross and started down the road had already said good-by to his friends. He was not coming back. He was going out to have it ended. The Cross made no compromise, modified nothing, spared nothing; it slew all of the man, completely and for good. It did not try to keep on good terms with its victim. It struck cruel and hard, and when it had finished its work, the man was no more.
The race of Adam is under death sentence. There is no commutation and no escape. God cannot approve any of the fruits of sin, however innocent they may appear or beautiful to the eyes of men. God salvages the individual by liquidating him and then raising him again to newness of life.
That evangelism which draws friendly parallels between the ways of God and the ways of men is false to the Bible and cruel to the souls of its hearers. The faith of Christ does not parallel the world, it intersects it. In coming to Christ we do not bring our old life up onto a higher plane; we leave it at the Cross. The corn of wheat must fall into the ground and die.
We who preach the gospel must not think of ourselves as public relations agents sent to establish good will between Christ and the world. We must not imagine ourselves commissioned to make Christ acceptable to big business, the press, the world of sports or modern education. We are not diplomats but prophets, and our message is not a compromise but an ultimatum.
God offers life, but not an improved old life. The life He offers is life out of death. It stands always on the far side of the Cross. Whoever would possess it must pass under the rod. He must repudiate himself and concur in God's just sentence against him.
What does this mean to the individual, the condemned man who would find life in Christ Jesus? How can this theology be translated into life? Simply, he must repent and believe. He must forsake his sins and then go on to forsake himself. Let him cover nothing, defend nothing, excuse nothing. Let him not seek to make terms with God, but let him bow his head before the stroke of God's stern displeasure and acknowledge himself worthy to die.
Having done this let him gaze with simple trust upon the risen Saviour, and from Him will come life and rebirth and cleansing and power. The Cross that ended the earthly life of Jesus now puts an end to the sinner; and the power that raised Christ from the dead now raises him to a new life along with Christ.
To any who may object to this or count it merely a narrow and private view of truth, let me say God has set His hallmark of approval upon this message from Paul's day to the present. Whether stated in these exact words or not, this has been the content of all preaching that has brought life and power to the world through the centuries. The mystics, the reformers, the revivalists have put their emphasis here, and signs and wonders and mighty operations of the Holy Spirit gave witness to God's approval.
Dare we, the heirs of such a legacy of power, tamper with the truth? Dare we with our stubby pencils erase the lines of the blueprint or alter the pattern shown us in the Mount? May God forbid! Let us preach the old Cross and will know the old power.
~A. W. Tozer~
(The End)
Saturday, September 8, 2018
Today's Sleep Giant # 2
Today's Sleeping Giant # 2
If the church is going to attain to her potential in this last hour, it is apparent that we are going to have to dust off an old word that many of us have forgotten is in the English language - DISCIPLINE! To some, this word discipline will have a monastic flavor, for it smells of the Middle Ages or throws onto the screen of the mind a picture of an unwashed hermit or a hollow-eyed anchorite. Be not deceived. Every smart "top brass military expert has arrived there because he wore the harness of discipline. This brings to mind the words of the poet: "The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, but they, while their companions slept, were toiling upward through the night!"
In a brilliant sermon called "Discipleship," G. Cambell Morgan says, "Jesus Christ could speak to the sorrow-burdened heart of humanity words so full of mother-love and father-love as to make men crowd and press round Him. On the other hand, He could suddenly speak words that flashed and scorched and burned until men drew back in astonishment." Bracketed in the last group would be these two commands: "Take my yoke upon you" and "My disciple, take up your cross and follow me." Both of these words imply discipline.
When we sing in a sunlit church "Oh to be like Thee; Oh to be like Thee," we get weepy and feel an emotional lift. But permit this simple challenge: Do we really mean "Oh to be like Thee" - like the Christ of God, who was a man of discipline? Do we really mean "Oh to be like Thee" - fasting alone in the desert? Do we mean "Oh to be like Thee" to touch the depths of prayer that make us cry, "All Thy billows are gone over me." Do we mean "Oh to be like Thee" - to become habituates of the prayer chamber? Do we mean "Oh to be like Thee" - in a will like His, for He said, "I always do the will of my Father." Is that not discipline?
The religious sentimentalist who sings "Just a closer walk with Thee" but walks close to the ungodly and sits with the blasphemers, is not taken seriously in either heaven or hell. Be very sure, friend, that this vile world is not "a friend to grace to hep on to God." We need to pray the Father to put some blood into this "water" that runs through our veins. Our Simon-like natures need the Upper Room fire to clean us out and the discipline of the Spirit to shape us into soldiers.
Twenty-five years of discipline in a crows-nest of an office up behind his church in Chicago brought about a Dr. A. W. Tozer, who produced a book, The Pursuit of God." This in turn produced on the ocean of spiritual teaching waves that lap their way to the ends of the earth.
Today, immediately when one gets out of step with a nearby Christian, he is considered a legalist. Just remember, in "that great day of judgment" when we must all stand before His throne, no man will be ashamed he was dubbed over-spiritual, though many will weep, groan, and "suffer loss" because of lack of discipline. Discipline is a harness by which we enable the Spirit to get the best out of our frail humanity. The Apostle Paul was a disciplinarian like his Master: He disciplined his body: I keep my body under." He disciplines himself to loneliness: "All men forsook me." To scorn: "We are fools for Christ's sake." To poverty: "We suffered need." To rejection: "We are despised." To death: "I die daily." To suffering: "Persecuted but not forsaken." May this be our prayer: "Oh Lord, I bow my neck to Thy yoke!"
Ambrose Fleming called the resurrection of Jesus Christ "the best attested fact in history". Yet at Easter time, vain effort is made to rationalize the stupendous event of the Resurrection in order to try to save face before pseudo-intelliectualism, which boggles at the fact that the Lord of glory died and rose again, triumphant over death, over hell, and over the grave. Who, then, can dispute the following biting statements of Murdo MacDonald in his book, The Vitality of Faith, "Ever since the Renaissance, men have been trying to water down the Christian creed. Give us a religion purged of everything that defies logic, a religion stripped of the supernatural and emptied of miracle, a religion that is smooth and palatable and rationally acceptable - this has been the popular cry". Surely, the church, weak in heart and courage, has gone out of the way to oblige.
The doom of this decaying civilization is spelled out in our crowded divorce courts, our all-time high of alcoholics and drug addicts, the number of illegitimate births or the number of abortions. A Gallup poll shows that these days most people accept lying as part of everyday business. Virtue is scorned!
TRUTH LIES FALLEN IN THE STREET!
Somewhere in the archives of the British Admiralty, they have the record of a fine piece of maritime strategy. Ships of five nations were anchored in a bay in the South Pacific. A fierce storm was gathering offshore. The British captain decided to run, not away from the storm but into it. Everything available was battened down. Out crashed the ship into the boiling seas-pitching, tossing, rolling, and shuddering. Indeed, she did everything but go down. A couple of days later, buffeted but not broken, she returned to the port to find the ships of the other nations piled up on the beach.
The storm of the ages is about to break. Let the church call its crew to a new dedication. Remembering that Christ is at the helm, and with Christ's crest as our ensign, let us run into the storm. After the storm, we, too, shall return to see upon the shores of time the battered, piled, wrecked, hell-inspired ideologies of the hour.
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(The End)
If the church is going to attain to her potential in this last hour, it is apparent that we are going to have to dust off an old word that many of us have forgotten is in the English language - DISCIPLINE! To some, this word discipline will have a monastic flavor, for it smells of the Middle Ages or throws onto the screen of the mind a picture of an unwashed hermit or a hollow-eyed anchorite. Be not deceived. Every smart "top brass military expert has arrived there because he wore the harness of discipline. This brings to mind the words of the poet: "The heights by great men reached and kept were not attained by sudden flight, but they, while their companions slept, were toiling upward through the night!"
In a brilliant sermon called "Discipleship," G. Cambell Morgan says, "Jesus Christ could speak to the sorrow-burdened heart of humanity words so full of mother-love and father-love as to make men crowd and press round Him. On the other hand, He could suddenly speak words that flashed and scorched and burned until men drew back in astonishment." Bracketed in the last group would be these two commands: "Take my yoke upon you" and "My disciple, take up your cross and follow me." Both of these words imply discipline.
When we sing in a sunlit church "Oh to be like Thee; Oh to be like Thee," we get weepy and feel an emotional lift. But permit this simple challenge: Do we really mean "Oh to be like Thee" - like the Christ of God, who was a man of discipline? Do we really mean "Oh to be like Thee" - fasting alone in the desert? Do we mean "Oh to be like Thee" to touch the depths of prayer that make us cry, "All Thy billows are gone over me." Do we mean "Oh to be like Thee" - to become habituates of the prayer chamber? Do we mean "Oh to be like Thee" - in a will like His, for He said, "I always do the will of my Father." Is that not discipline?
The religious sentimentalist who sings "Just a closer walk with Thee" but walks close to the ungodly and sits with the blasphemers, is not taken seriously in either heaven or hell. Be very sure, friend, that this vile world is not "a friend to grace to hep on to God." We need to pray the Father to put some blood into this "water" that runs through our veins. Our Simon-like natures need the Upper Room fire to clean us out and the discipline of the Spirit to shape us into soldiers.
Twenty-five years of discipline in a crows-nest of an office up behind his church in Chicago brought about a Dr. A. W. Tozer, who produced a book, The Pursuit of God." This in turn produced on the ocean of spiritual teaching waves that lap their way to the ends of the earth.
Today, immediately when one gets out of step with a nearby Christian, he is considered a legalist. Just remember, in "that great day of judgment" when we must all stand before His throne, no man will be ashamed he was dubbed over-spiritual, though many will weep, groan, and "suffer loss" because of lack of discipline. Discipline is a harness by which we enable the Spirit to get the best out of our frail humanity. The Apostle Paul was a disciplinarian like his Master: He disciplined his body: I keep my body under." He disciplines himself to loneliness: "All men forsook me." To scorn: "We are fools for Christ's sake." To poverty: "We suffered need." To rejection: "We are despised." To death: "I die daily." To suffering: "Persecuted but not forsaken." May this be our prayer: "Oh Lord, I bow my neck to Thy yoke!"
Ambrose Fleming called the resurrection of Jesus Christ "the best attested fact in history". Yet at Easter time, vain effort is made to rationalize the stupendous event of the Resurrection in order to try to save face before pseudo-intelliectualism, which boggles at the fact that the Lord of glory died and rose again, triumphant over death, over hell, and over the grave. Who, then, can dispute the following biting statements of Murdo MacDonald in his book, The Vitality of Faith, "Ever since the Renaissance, men have been trying to water down the Christian creed. Give us a religion purged of everything that defies logic, a religion stripped of the supernatural and emptied of miracle, a religion that is smooth and palatable and rationally acceptable - this has been the popular cry". Surely, the church, weak in heart and courage, has gone out of the way to oblige.
The doom of this decaying civilization is spelled out in our crowded divorce courts, our all-time high of alcoholics and drug addicts, the number of illegitimate births or the number of abortions. A Gallup poll shows that these days most people accept lying as part of everyday business. Virtue is scorned!
TRUTH LIES FALLEN IN THE STREET!
Somewhere in the archives of the British Admiralty, they have the record of a fine piece of maritime strategy. Ships of five nations were anchored in a bay in the South Pacific. A fierce storm was gathering offshore. The British captain decided to run, not away from the storm but into it. Everything available was battened down. Out crashed the ship into the boiling seas-pitching, tossing, rolling, and shuddering. Indeed, she did everything but go down. A couple of days later, buffeted but not broken, she returned to the port to find the ships of the other nations piled up on the beach.
The storm of the ages is about to break. Let the church call its crew to a new dedication. Remembering that Christ is at the helm, and with Christ's crest as our ensign, let us run into the storm. After the storm, we, too, shall return to see upon the shores of time the battered, piled, wrecked, hell-inspired ideologies of the hour.
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(The End)
Today's Sleeping Giant # 1
Today's Sleeping Giant # 1
Solemnly and slowly, with his index finger extended, Napoleon Bonaparte outlined a great stretch of country on a map of the world. "There," he growled, "is a sleeping giant. Let him sleep! If he wakes, he will shake the world." That sleeping giant was China. Today, Bonaparte's prophecy of some one hundred and fifty years ago makes sense.
Today lucifer is probably surveying the church just as Bonaparte did China. One can almost behold the fear in his eyes as he thinks of the Church's unmeasured potential and growls, "Let the Church sleep! If she awakes, she will shake the world." Is not the Church the sleeping giant of today?
As today's Church thinks about the day of reckoning that is surely coming, of that a holy fear would come upon her (even if it drives her to extremes) in order to arouse her from her present paralysis!
Consider Samson's fall. He didn't get drunk; he didn't commit murder; he didn't steal. Samson fell simply because he succumbed to the natural, and fell asleep. That one small act put him into captivity, made a false god popular, and scattered the forces of the true and living God.
If even yet you feel a hangover of the old interpretation that the Samson of the Bible is a distant relative of Hercules or Atlas (famed in mythology for carrying the world on his back), then think again. Samson was no human monstrosity. He was no super-edition of a Goliath. If Samson had been a colossus, they why did Delilah ask the question, "Wherein lieth thy great strength?"
Let the final word be from the Word of God itself, for in telling the story of men mighty in faith, the writer of Hebrews says: Time would fail me to tell of Gideon, and of Barak, and of Samson...who through faith...stopped the mouths of lions" Heb. 11:32-33). Only two men in Scripture stopped the mouths of lions - Daniel and Samson. But no giant could single-handedly, as Samson, "put to flight the armies of the aliens," or toy with opposing armies. Here, Samson slays a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass; there, he kills another thirty men. Here, he takes the gates of Gaza for a ride; there, he tears a lion like paper. To add insult to injury, the Spirit's comment is "he had nothing in his hand."
Note well, yea, read for yourself the whole story of the secret of this mighty exploiter, this more-than-conquering believer: "The Spirit of the Lord rested mightily upon him." Everything in the story adds up to this staggering fact: Supernatural power was upon Samson.
Alas that today there is more evidence of religious sensation before our eyes than evidence of spiritual regeneration and supernatural phenomenon! Not many Christians today can forget the fact that the devil goeth about as a roaring lion, but we seem to have lost sight of the fact that the Lion of the tribe of Judah had defeated the roaring lion of hell, and therefore every anointed Samson or Gideon or church can also slay the lion of hell! Though wicked men are doing wickedly, God's promise to us is that "the people that do know their God shall be strong and do exploits" (Daniel 11:32).
God pity us that after years of writing, using mountains of paper and rivers of ink, exhausting flashy terminology about the biggest revival meetings in history, we are still faced with gross corruption in every nation, as well as with most prayerless church age since Pentecost!
This is a plea for the return of the supernatural; but I must also give this a word of explanation. For a decade, all over this land there has been a ministry of the miraculous (more or less), and thank God for all who honor Him and remain faithful. But having said that, here is a plea for sane thinking and a spiritual evaluation of the evangelistic field. To a large degree, have we not substituted seeing for hearing? In Acts, Philip the evangelist could have transferred the Ethiopian eunuch to a city seething with revival fever where the eunuch could have seen "the lame leap like an hart and the tongue of the dumb sing." Instead, he pitched right into the Word of the living God, and beginning at the same Scripture preached unto him Jesus. We need the miraculous but we also need Christ-centered teaching. Our crucified, exalted Christ must have preeminence over all other slants of truth, for while the Church is languishing, the world is perishing. "Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord..." (Isaiah 51:9).
Again let me say, Samson's size was not the secret of his strength. The fact that he was the same size after he backslid negates the idea that he was a giant. His only external peculiarity was his long locks, uncut because he was a Nazarite. Nor had his long hair in itself any abnormal power. Samson's secret was obedience. As long as Samson trod the straight and narrow path of obedience, he was invincible.
Let us remember, too, that Samson, who began in the Spirit, fell into the flesh, and so had a prison term to bring him to his senses. Finally, by one last mighty miracle, he finished in the Spirit. Backslider, this is a word for your recovery, for God can restore the years that the cankerworm and the caterpillar have eaten. He who is able delights in mercy.
Samson's final act of power was the crowning achievement of a spectacular lifes work. After he had slipped out from under the harness of obedience, he was forced into separation from the world in a prison. Once an army trembled at his very sight; later a single boy came to lead the blinded Samson into the temple of Dragon, the fish-god. How the mighty had fallen! Yet now, God took this "weak thing" into a temple full of lords of the Philistines and set him between the pillars. "Samson took hold of the pillars...the one with his right hand and the other with his left...and he bowed himself with all His might" (Judges 16:29-30). Holy jealousy gripped him. Mighty as he had been in other things, Samson now proved mightiest in prayer: "Lord, strengthen me...this once!" Would to God that every professed believer in the whole of Christendom would borrow this prayer and mean it! Then with dramatic conclusion, Samson sealed the doom of many more of the enemies of God in his dying than in his living.
Is this the dying hour of this dispensation? Many say it is. Some Christians have already hung their harps on the willows, and yet others seem to delight in speaking of the Church's present lapse as a proof of divine inspiration. But I myself believe that if the Church will only obey the conditions, she can have a revival any time she wants it. The problem of the Church is the problem in the garden of Gethsemane - sleep! For while men sleep, the enemy, sows his seed through his cults. Lest men sleep the sleep of eternal death, Oh arm of the Lord, Oh Church of the living God, awake!
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(continued with # 2)
Solemnly and slowly, with his index finger extended, Napoleon Bonaparte outlined a great stretch of country on a map of the world. "There," he growled, "is a sleeping giant. Let him sleep! If he wakes, he will shake the world." That sleeping giant was China. Today, Bonaparte's prophecy of some one hundred and fifty years ago makes sense.
Today lucifer is probably surveying the church just as Bonaparte did China. One can almost behold the fear in his eyes as he thinks of the Church's unmeasured potential and growls, "Let the Church sleep! If she awakes, she will shake the world." Is not the Church the sleeping giant of today?
As today's Church thinks about the day of reckoning that is surely coming, of that a holy fear would come upon her (even if it drives her to extremes) in order to arouse her from her present paralysis!
Consider Samson's fall. He didn't get drunk; he didn't commit murder; he didn't steal. Samson fell simply because he succumbed to the natural, and fell asleep. That one small act put him into captivity, made a false god popular, and scattered the forces of the true and living God.
If even yet you feel a hangover of the old interpretation that the Samson of the Bible is a distant relative of Hercules or Atlas (famed in mythology for carrying the world on his back), then think again. Samson was no human monstrosity. He was no super-edition of a Goliath. If Samson had been a colossus, they why did Delilah ask the question, "Wherein lieth thy great strength?"
Let the final word be from the Word of God itself, for in telling the story of men mighty in faith, the writer of Hebrews says: Time would fail me to tell of Gideon, and of Barak, and of Samson...who through faith...stopped the mouths of lions" Heb. 11:32-33). Only two men in Scripture stopped the mouths of lions - Daniel and Samson. But no giant could single-handedly, as Samson, "put to flight the armies of the aliens," or toy with opposing armies. Here, Samson slays a thousand men with the jawbone of an ass; there, he kills another thirty men. Here, he takes the gates of Gaza for a ride; there, he tears a lion like paper. To add insult to injury, the Spirit's comment is "he had nothing in his hand."
Note well, yea, read for yourself the whole story of the secret of this mighty exploiter, this more-than-conquering believer: "The Spirit of the Lord rested mightily upon him." Everything in the story adds up to this staggering fact: Supernatural power was upon Samson.
Alas that today there is more evidence of religious sensation before our eyes than evidence of spiritual regeneration and supernatural phenomenon! Not many Christians today can forget the fact that the devil goeth about as a roaring lion, but we seem to have lost sight of the fact that the Lion of the tribe of Judah had defeated the roaring lion of hell, and therefore every anointed Samson or Gideon or church can also slay the lion of hell! Though wicked men are doing wickedly, God's promise to us is that "the people that do know their God shall be strong and do exploits" (Daniel 11:32).
God pity us that after years of writing, using mountains of paper and rivers of ink, exhausting flashy terminology about the biggest revival meetings in history, we are still faced with gross corruption in every nation, as well as with most prayerless church age since Pentecost!
This is a plea for the return of the supernatural; but I must also give this a word of explanation. For a decade, all over this land there has been a ministry of the miraculous (more or less), and thank God for all who honor Him and remain faithful. But having said that, here is a plea for sane thinking and a spiritual evaluation of the evangelistic field. To a large degree, have we not substituted seeing for hearing? In Acts, Philip the evangelist could have transferred the Ethiopian eunuch to a city seething with revival fever where the eunuch could have seen "the lame leap like an hart and the tongue of the dumb sing." Instead, he pitched right into the Word of the living God, and beginning at the same Scripture preached unto him Jesus. We need the miraculous but we also need Christ-centered teaching. Our crucified, exalted Christ must have preeminence over all other slants of truth, for while the Church is languishing, the world is perishing. "Awake, awake, put on strength, O arm of the Lord..." (Isaiah 51:9).
Again let me say, Samson's size was not the secret of his strength. The fact that he was the same size after he backslid negates the idea that he was a giant. His only external peculiarity was his long locks, uncut because he was a Nazarite. Nor had his long hair in itself any abnormal power. Samson's secret was obedience. As long as Samson trod the straight and narrow path of obedience, he was invincible.
Let us remember, too, that Samson, who began in the Spirit, fell into the flesh, and so had a prison term to bring him to his senses. Finally, by one last mighty miracle, he finished in the Spirit. Backslider, this is a word for your recovery, for God can restore the years that the cankerworm and the caterpillar have eaten. He who is able delights in mercy.
Samson's final act of power was the crowning achievement of a spectacular lifes work. After he had slipped out from under the harness of obedience, he was forced into separation from the world in a prison. Once an army trembled at his very sight; later a single boy came to lead the blinded Samson into the temple of Dragon, the fish-god. How the mighty had fallen! Yet now, God took this "weak thing" into a temple full of lords of the Philistines and set him between the pillars. "Samson took hold of the pillars...the one with his right hand and the other with his left...and he bowed himself with all His might" (Judges 16:29-30). Holy jealousy gripped him. Mighty as he had been in other things, Samson now proved mightiest in prayer: "Lord, strengthen me...this once!" Would to God that every professed believer in the whole of Christendom would borrow this prayer and mean it! Then with dramatic conclusion, Samson sealed the doom of many more of the enemies of God in his dying than in his living.
Is this the dying hour of this dispensation? Many say it is. Some Christians have already hung their harps on the willows, and yet others seem to delight in speaking of the Church's present lapse as a proof of divine inspiration. But I myself believe that if the Church will only obey the conditions, she can have a revival any time she wants it. The problem of the Church is the problem in the garden of Gethsemane - sleep! For while men sleep, the enemy, sows his seed through his cults. Lest men sleep the sleep of eternal death, Oh arm of the Lord, Oh Church of the living God, awake!
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(continued with # 2)
The Great Separation # 5
The Great Separation # 5
4. Let me show you, in the last place, the portion which remains for all who are not Christ's people.
The text at the beginning of this paper describes this in words which should make our ears tingle - "Christ shall burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire!"
When the Lord Jesus comes to purge His threshing floor - He shall punish all who are not His disciples with a fearful punishment. All who are found impenitent and unbelieving - all who have held the truth in unrighteousness - all who have clung to sin, stuck to the world, and set their affection on things below - all who are without Christ. All such shall come to an awful end! Christ shall "burn up the chaff!"
Their punishment shall be most SEVERE. There is no pain like that of burning. Put your finger in the candle flame for a moment, if you doubt this, and try. Fire is the most destructive and devouring of all elements. Look into the opening of a fireplace - and think what it would be to be there. Fire is of all elements most opposed to life. Creatures can live in air, and earth, and water - but nothing can live in fire! Yet fire is the portion to which the Christless and unbelieving will come. Christ will "burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire!"
Their punishment shall be ETERNAL. Millions of ages shall pass away, and the fire into which the chaff is cast, shall still burn on. It is "unquenchable fire" - it shall burn on and on. They are a part of that Scripture which is all profitable, and they ought to be heard. As painful as the subject of hell is - it is one about which I dare not, cannot, must not be silent. Who would desire to speak of hell-fire - if God had not spoken of it? When God has spoken of it so plainly - who can safely hold his peace?
I dare not shut my eyes to the fact, that a deep-rooted infidelity lurks in men's minds on the subject of hell. I see it oozing out in the utter apathy of some - they eat, and drink, and sleep - as if there was no wrath to come! I see it creeping forth in the coldness of others about their neighbors' souls - they show little concern to pluck brands from the fire. I desire to denounce such infidelity with all my might. Believing that there are terrors of the Lord, as well as the recompense of reward - I call upon all who profess to believe the Bible, to be on their guard.
I know that some do not believe there is any hell at all. They think it impossible there can be such a place. They call it inconsistent with the mercy of God. The devil of course rejoices in the views of such people. They help his kingdom mightily. They are preaching up his favorite old doctrine, "You shall not surely die!"
I know furthermore, that some do not believe that hell is eternal. They tell us it is incredible that a compassionate God will punish men forever. He will surely open the prison doors at last. This also is a mighty help to the devil's cause. "Take your ease," he whispers to sinners - "if you do make a mistake, never mind, it is not forever."
I know also that some believe that there is a hell - but never allow that anybody is going there! All people with them are "good" as soon as they die - all were sincere - all meant well - and all, they hope, got to Heaven. Alas, what a common delusion is this! I can well understand the feeling of the little girl who asked her mother where all the wicked people were buried, "for she found no mention on the gravestones of any except the good." There are others who see no profit in talking about hell, and are rather shocked when it is mentioned. This also is an immense help to the devil. "Hush, hush!" says satan, "say nothing about hell." The fowler wishes to hear no noise when he lays his snare. The wolf would like the shepherd to sleep while he prowls round the fold. The devil rejoices when Christians are silent about hell!
There is only one point to be settled - "What says the Word of God?"
Do you believe the Bible? Then depend upon it, hell is real and true. Disbelieve hell - and you unscrew, unsettle, and unpin everything in Scripture! You may as well throw your Bible away at once. From "no hell" to "no God" there is but a series of steps.
Hell will have inhabitants. The wicked shall certainly be turned into hell, and all the people that forget God. They shall go away into everlasting punishment. The same blessed Saviour who not sits on a throne of grace, will one day sit on a throne of judgment - and men will see there is such a thing as "the wrath of the Lamb!"
Hell will be intense and unutterable woe. Oh, beloved, the miseries of mind and conscience, are far worse than those of the body! The whole extent of hell, the present suffering, the bitter recollection of the past, the hopeless prospect of the future - will never be thoroughly known, except by those who go there!
And where is there warrant for saying that hell can ever change a heart, or make it fit for heaven? Hell must be eternal, or hell would cease to be hell altogether. Give a man hope - and he will bear anything.
FOREVER is the most solemn word in the Bible! Alas, for that day which shall have no tomorrow! That day when men shall seek death, and not find it, and shall desire to die. Who shall dwell with devouring fire! Who shall dwell with everlasting burnings!
Hell is a subject that ought not to be kept back. Truly it may well be doubted whether we ministers speak of it as much as we ought. I cannot forget the words of a dying hearer of Mr. Newton's - "Sir, you often told me of Christ and salvation; why did you not oftener remind me of hell and danger?" I fear that thousands are on that broad way that leads to it, and I would sincerely arouse them to a sense of the peril before them. What ought to be said of us as ministers, if we call ourselves watchmen for souls, and yet see the fires of hell raging in the distance - and never give the alarm? Call it bad taste, if you like, to speak of hell. Call it charity to make things pleasant, and speak smoothly, and soothe men with constant lullaby of peace. From such notions may I ever be delivered! My notion of charity is to warn men plainly of danger! My notion of taste in the ministerial office, is to declare ALL the counsel of God. If I never spoke of hell - I would think I had kept back something that was profitable - and would look on myself as an accomplice of the devil!
I beseech you, in all tender affection, beware of false views of the subject on which I have been dwelling. Beware of new and strange doctrines about hell and the eternity of punishment. Beware of manufacturing a God of your own; a God who is all mercy - but not just; a God who is all love - but not holy; a God who has a heaven for everybody - but a hell for none; a God who can allow good and evil to be side by side in time - but will make no distinction between good and evil in eternity. Such a God is an idol of your own imagination! He is not the God of the Bible. Take heed, there is a fire for the chaff! Take heed, lest you find out to your cost too late! You must take the Bible as it is. You must read it all, and believe it all. Dare not say, "I believe this verse, for I like it. I reject that, for I do not like it. By what right do you talk in this way? Surely it were better to say over every chapter in the Word, "Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening!" If men would do this, they would never deny hell, the chaff, and the fire!
I have shown you the two great classes of mankind - the wheat and the chaff. I have shown you the separation which will one day take place. I have shown you the safety of the Lord's people. I have shown you the fearful portion of the Christless and unbelieving.
I commend these things to your conscience, as in the sight of God. And now, reader, let me say four things in CONCLUSION, and then I am done.
~J. C. Ryle~
(continued with # 6)
4. Let me show you, in the last place, the portion which remains for all who are not Christ's people.
The text at the beginning of this paper describes this in words which should make our ears tingle - "Christ shall burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire!"
When the Lord Jesus comes to purge His threshing floor - He shall punish all who are not His disciples with a fearful punishment. All who are found impenitent and unbelieving - all who have held the truth in unrighteousness - all who have clung to sin, stuck to the world, and set their affection on things below - all who are without Christ. All such shall come to an awful end! Christ shall "burn up the chaff!"
Their punishment shall be most SEVERE. There is no pain like that of burning. Put your finger in the candle flame for a moment, if you doubt this, and try. Fire is the most destructive and devouring of all elements. Look into the opening of a fireplace - and think what it would be to be there. Fire is of all elements most opposed to life. Creatures can live in air, and earth, and water - but nothing can live in fire! Yet fire is the portion to which the Christless and unbelieving will come. Christ will "burn up the chaff with unquenchable fire!"
Their punishment shall be ETERNAL. Millions of ages shall pass away, and the fire into which the chaff is cast, shall still burn on. It is "unquenchable fire" - it shall burn on and on. They are a part of that Scripture which is all profitable, and they ought to be heard. As painful as the subject of hell is - it is one about which I dare not, cannot, must not be silent. Who would desire to speak of hell-fire - if God had not spoken of it? When God has spoken of it so plainly - who can safely hold his peace?
I dare not shut my eyes to the fact, that a deep-rooted infidelity lurks in men's minds on the subject of hell. I see it oozing out in the utter apathy of some - they eat, and drink, and sleep - as if there was no wrath to come! I see it creeping forth in the coldness of others about their neighbors' souls - they show little concern to pluck brands from the fire. I desire to denounce such infidelity with all my might. Believing that there are terrors of the Lord, as well as the recompense of reward - I call upon all who profess to believe the Bible, to be on their guard.
I know that some do not believe there is any hell at all. They think it impossible there can be such a place. They call it inconsistent with the mercy of God. The devil of course rejoices in the views of such people. They help his kingdom mightily. They are preaching up his favorite old doctrine, "You shall not surely die!"
I know furthermore, that some do not believe that hell is eternal. They tell us it is incredible that a compassionate God will punish men forever. He will surely open the prison doors at last. This also is a mighty help to the devil's cause. "Take your ease," he whispers to sinners - "if you do make a mistake, never mind, it is not forever."
I know also that some believe that there is a hell - but never allow that anybody is going there! All people with them are "good" as soon as they die - all were sincere - all meant well - and all, they hope, got to Heaven. Alas, what a common delusion is this! I can well understand the feeling of the little girl who asked her mother where all the wicked people were buried, "for she found no mention on the gravestones of any except the good." There are others who see no profit in talking about hell, and are rather shocked when it is mentioned. This also is an immense help to the devil. "Hush, hush!" says satan, "say nothing about hell." The fowler wishes to hear no noise when he lays his snare. The wolf would like the shepherd to sleep while he prowls round the fold. The devil rejoices when Christians are silent about hell!
There is only one point to be settled - "What says the Word of God?"
Do you believe the Bible? Then depend upon it, hell is real and true. Disbelieve hell - and you unscrew, unsettle, and unpin everything in Scripture! You may as well throw your Bible away at once. From "no hell" to "no God" there is but a series of steps.
Hell will have inhabitants. The wicked shall certainly be turned into hell, and all the people that forget God. They shall go away into everlasting punishment. The same blessed Saviour who not sits on a throne of grace, will one day sit on a throne of judgment - and men will see there is such a thing as "the wrath of the Lamb!"
Hell will be intense and unutterable woe. Oh, beloved, the miseries of mind and conscience, are far worse than those of the body! The whole extent of hell, the present suffering, the bitter recollection of the past, the hopeless prospect of the future - will never be thoroughly known, except by those who go there!
And where is there warrant for saying that hell can ever change a heart, or make it fit for heaven? Hell must be eternal, or hell would cease to be hell altogether. Give a man hope - and he will bear anything.
FOREVER is the most solemn word in the Bible! Alas, for that day which shall have no tomorrow! That day when men shall seek death, and not find it, and shall desire to die. Who shall dwell with devouring fire! Who shall dwell with everlasting burnings!
Hell is a subject that ought not to be kept back. Truly it may well be doubted whether we ministers speak of it as much as we ought. I cannot forget the words of a dying hearer of Mr. Newton's - "Sir, you often told me of Christ and salvation; why did you not oftener remind me of hell and danger?" I fear that thousands are on that broad way that leads to it, and I would sincerely arouse them to a sense of the peril before them. What ought to be said of us as ministers, if we call ourselves watchmen for souls, and yet see the fires of hell raging in the distance - and never give the alarm? Call it bad taste, if you like, to speak of hell. Call it charity to make things pleasant, and speak smoothly, and soothe men with constant lullaby of peace. From such notions may I ever be delivered! My notion of charity is to warn men plainly of danger! My notion of taste in the ministerial office, is to declare ALL the counsel of God. If I never spoke of hell - I would think I had kept back something that was profitable - and would look on myself as an accomplice of the devil!
I beseech you, in all tender affection, beware of false views of the subject on which I have been dwelling. Beware of new and strange doctrines about hell and the eternity of punishment. Beware of manufacturing a God of your own; a God who is all mercy - but not just; a God who is all love - but not holy; a God who has a heaven for everybody - but a hell for none; a God who can allow good and evil to be side by side in time - but will make no distinction between good and evil in eternity. Such a God is an idol of your own imagination! He is not the God of the Bible. Take heed, there is a fire for the chaff! Take heed, lest you find out to your cost too late! You must take the Bible as it is. You must read it all, and believe it all. Dare not say, "I believe this verse, for I like it. I reject that, for I do not like it. By what right do you talk in this way? Surely it were better to say over every chapter in the Word, "Speak, Lord, for your servant is listening!" If men would do this, they would never deny hell, the chaff, and the fire!
I have shown you the two great classes of mankind - the wheat and the chaff. I have shown you the separation which will one day take place. I have shown you the safety of the Lord's people. I have shown you the fearful portion of the Christless and unbelieving.
I commend these things to your conscience, as in the sight of God. And now, reader, let me say four things in CONCLUSION, and then I am done.
~J. C. Ryle~
(continued with # 6)
Had I A Thousand Lives, A Thousand Souls (and Others)
Had I A Thousand Lives, A Thousand Souls (and others)
"My meditation of Him shall be sweet!" (Psalm 104:34).
It is the tendency of love - to excite in the mind, many thoughts about the beloved object. A right knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, will fill the mind with thoughts and meditations concerning Him - so as to excite the affections to cleave to Him with delight. A discovery of the glory of His Person, of the perfection of His atoning sacrifice, and of the fullness of His grace - must inspire the heart with love to Him! "Yes, He is very precious to you who believe!" (1 Peter 2:7).
It is much to be lamented - that those who profess a sincere attachment to the Redeemer, should have their thoughts so little employed about Him. Where a multitude of worldly cares, desires, fears and hopes prevail in the mind - they cumber and perplex it - so as to bring on a great disinclination to spiritual meditation.
The advice of the apostle Paul is of great importance in this case. "If you then are risen with Christ - seek those things which are above, where Christ sits at the right hand of God. Set your affection (your mind, your thoughts) on things above, not on things on the earth." But earthly and sensual affections fill the hearts and heads of men, with multitudes of thoughts concerning those objects on which they are fixed,so as to leave no room, nor any inclination for spiritual and heavenly thoughts.
"Shall not my thoughts," says the believer, "be frequently employed in meditating on the love of that infinitely glorious person, to whom I am indebted for deliverance from the greatest misery - and for all the hope I have of being one day advanced to everlasting glory and felicity! He poured out His holy soul in agonies, under the curse of the avenging law - to make me a partaker of eternal blessedness! He perfectly fulfilled the precepts of that holy law, that I, by His obedience, might be made righteous!"
This glorious and adorable Redeemer, thought upon us long before the foundations of the world were laid. He bore us on His heart when He hung on the Cross; when He was torn with wounds, and racked with pain; when He poured out His dying groans, and spilt His blood.
He remembers us now, when He is exalted at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens; and will never, never forget us, through all the ages of eternity! Surely then, we ought to think of Him! Impressed with a sense of His everlasting kindness - we should be ready to say, "If I forget you, O blessed Jesus - let my right hand forget its skill. May my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth, if I fail to remember You, if I don't make You my highest joy!"
What holy transports of soul, what divine delights - have many Christians experienced, in meditating on the glories of the Redeemer! Ascending the mount of contemplation, their souls have taken wing - and explored the height and depth, the length and breadth of the love of Christ, which passes knowledge! They have seen by the eye of faith - that He is infinitely lovely in Himself, that He is the admiration of angels, the darling of heaven, and the delight of the Father! They have viewed Him in the brightness of His ineffable glory, clothed with indescribable majesty and honor! They have been transported with the smiles of His countenance, and said of Him, "He is the chief among ten thousand, and altogether lovely!"
They have also considered their own unworthiness, and said, "Can such a wretch as I - be the object of His love? So vile a worm, so unprofitable a creature, so great a sinner, one so deserving of His everlasting abhorrence! Has He loved me, so as to give Himself for me? O what marvelous kindness is this! Is my worthless name written in His book of life? Am I redeemed by His blood, renewed by His Spirit, beautified with His loveliness, and clothed in His righteousness? O wonder of wonders! How can I forbear to love this adorable Saviour? Can I withhold my choicest affections from Him? Ah no! Had I a thousand lives, a thousand souls - they would all be devoted to Him! You tempting vanities of this base world; you flattering honors, you deceitful riches - Adieu! Jesus is my All! He is my light, my life, my unfailing treasure, my everlasting portion! Nothing below the skies, is deserving of my love! Precious Redeemer, in You the boundless wishes of my soul are filled! I long to leave this tenement of clay, and to rest in the bosom of Your love forever!"
"My meditation of Him shall be sweet!" (Psalm 104:34).
~John Fawcett~
________________________
What More Can Any Christian Desire?
"As for me, God forbid that I should boast about anything except the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Galatians 6:14).
There is enough in a suffering Christ, to fill us and satisfy us to the full. He has the greatest worth and wealth in Him. Look, as the worth and value of many pieces of silver is to be found in one piece of gold; just so, all the petty excellencies which are scattered abroad in the creatures - are to be found in a bleeding, dying Christ! Yes, all the whole volume of perfections which is spread through heaven and earth - is epitomized in Him who suffered on the Cross! A man cannot exaggerate, in speaking of the glories of Christ. Certainly it is as easy to contain the sea in a sea shell - as to fully relate the transcendent excellencies of a suffering Christ!
O sirs! there is in a crucified Jesus - something proportionate to all the straits, needs, necessities, and desires of His poor people. He is...
bread to nourish them,
a garment to cover and adorn them,
a physician to heal them,
a counselor to advise them,
a captain to defend them,
a prince to rule them,
a prophet to teach them,
a priest to make atonement for them;
a husband to protect them,
a brother to relieve them,
a foundation to support them,
a head to guide them,
a treasure to enrich them,
a sun to enlighten them, and
a fountain to cleanse them!
What more can any Christian desire - to satisfy him and save him; and to make him holy and happy in time and eternity?
~Thomas Brooks~
"My meditation of Him shall be sweet!" (Psalm 104:34).
It is the tendency of love - to excite in the mind, many thoughts about the beloved object. A right knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ, will fill the mind with thoughts and meditations concerning Him - so as to excite the affections to cleave to Him with delight. A discovery of the glory of His Person, of the perfection of His atoning sacrifice, and of the fullness of His grace - must inspire the heart with love to Him! "Yes, He is very precious to you who believe!" (1 Peter 2:7).
It is much to be lamented - that those who profess a sincere attachment to the Redeemer, should have their thoughts so little employed about Him. Where a multitude of worldly cares, desires, fears and hopes prevail in the mind - they cumber and perplex it - so as to bring on a great disinclination to spiritual meditation.
The advice of the apostle Paul is of great importance in this case. "If you then are risen with Christ - seek those things which are above, where Christ sits at the right hand of God. Set your affection (your mind, your thoughts) on things above, not on things on the earth." But earthly and sensual affections fill the hearts and heads of men, with multitudes of thoughts concerning those objects on which they are fixed,so as to leave no room, nor any inclination for spiritual and heavenly thoughts.
"Shall not my thoughts," says the believer, "be frequently employed in meditating on the love of that infinitely glorious person, to whom I am indebted for deliverance from the greatest misery - and for all the hope I have of being one day advanced to everlasting glory and felicity! He poured out His holy soul in agonies, under the curse of the avenging law - to make me a partaker of eternal blessedness! He perfectly fulfilled the precepts of that holy law, that I, by His obedience, might be made righteous!"
This glorious and adorable Redeemer, thought upon us long before the foundations of the world were laid. He bore us on His heart when He hung on the Cross; when He was torn with wounds, and racked with pain; when He poured out His dying groans, and spilt His blood.
He remembers us now, when He is exalted at the right hand of the Majesty in the heavens; and will never, never forget us, through all the ages of eternity! Surely then, we ought to think of Him! Impressed with a sense of His everlasting kindness - we should be ready to say, "If I forget you, O blessed Jesus - let my right hand forget its skill. May my tongue stick to the roof of my mouth, if I fail to remember You, if I don't make You my highest joy!"
What holy transports of soul, what divine delights - have many Christians experienced, in meditating on the glories of the Redeemer! Ascending the mount of contemplation, their souls have taken wing - and explored the height and depth, the length and breadth of the love of Christ, which passes knowledge! They have seen by the eye of faith - that He is infinitely lovely in Himself, that He is the admiration of angels, the darling of heaven, and the delight of the Father! They have viewed Him in the brightness of His ineffable glory, clothed with indescribable majesty and honor! They have been transported with the smiles of His countenance, and said of Him, "He is the chief among ten thousand, and altogether lovely!"
They have also considered their own unworthiness, and said, "Can such a wretch as I - be the object of His love? So vile a worm, so unprofitable a creature, so great a sinner, one so deserving of His everlasting abhorrence! Has He loved me, so as to give Himself for me? O what marvelous kindness is this! Is my worthless name written in His book of life? Am I redeemed by His blood, renewed by His Spirit, beautified with His loveliness, and clothed in His righteousness? O wonder of wonders! How can I forbear to love this adorable Saviour? Can I withhold my choicest affections from Him? Ah no! Had I a thousand lives, a thousand souls - they would all be devoted to Him! You tempting vanities of this base world; you flattering honors, you deceitful riches - Adieu! Jesus is my All! He is my light, my life, my unfailing treasure, my everlasting portion! Nothing below the skies, is deserving of my love! Precious Redeemer, in You the boundless wishes of my soul are filled! I long to leave this tenement of clay, and to rest in the bosom of Your love forever!"
"My meditation of Him shall be sweet!" (Psalm 104:34).
~John Fawcett~
________________________
What More Can Any Christian Desire?
"As for me, God forbid that I should boast about anything except the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ" (Galatians 6:14).
There is enough in a suffering Christ, to fill us and satisfy us to the full. He has the greatest worth and wealth in Him. Look, as the worth and value of many pieces of silver is to be found in one piece of gold; just so, all the petty excellencies which are scattered abroad in the creatures - are to be found in a bleeding, dying Christ! Yes, all the whole volume of perfections which is spread through heaven and earth - is epitomized in Him who suffered on the Cross! A man cannot exaggerate, in speaking of the glories of Christ. Certainly it is as easy to contain the sea in a sea shell - as to fully relate the transcendent excellencies of a suffering Christ!
O sirs! there is in a crucified Jesus - something proportionate to all the straits, needs, necessities, and desires of His poor people. He is...
bread to nourish them,
a garment to cover and adorn them,
a physician to heal them,
a counselor to advise them,
a captain to defend them,
a prince to rule them,
a prophet to teach them,
a priest to make atonement for them;
a husband to protect them,
a brother to relieve them,
a foundation to support them,
a head to guide them,
a treasure to enrich them,
a sun to enlighten them, and
a fountain to cleanse them!
What more can any Christian desire - to satisfy him and save him; and to make him holy and happy in time and eternity?
~Thomas Brooks~
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