O man, hast thou received the very truth, and the whole truth of God? He has given man a book for a standard, not that he may speculate, but that he may not speculate, but believe. What God, in and by that book, demands of men is not criticism, opinion, speculation, but BELIEF. God’s eyes are on the truth, to see if men believe it.
The day is at hand, the great day of the Lord, when TRUTH only shall be set on high, and error put to shame. O man, God’s eyes are on the truth, let thine be on it too. Be true to truth; be true to thyself; be true to God. ~HORATIUS BONAR~
-Taken from Light & Truth: Bible Thoughts and Themes, Vol. I, 1868.
“O Lord, are not thine eyes upon the truth?” –Jeremiah 5:3
The word “truth” in Scripture refers both to doctrine and practice. It points both to the “error” and the “lie.” It classes both together. It condemns both. False speaking, whether in reference to teaching or witness-bearing, is declared to be abominable to God. His eyes are upon the truth. They watch over it, to guard it and to maintain it.
The theory of many is that God’s eyes are not upon the truth, and that therefore a man may believe what he pleases, and say what he likes, without fearing God’s displeasure. It is only when the untrue thing which he thinks and says interferes with human rights, or social privileges that he is to be visited with punishment. Jehovah’s eyes, then, are upon the truth,–the truth as found on earth among the sons of men.
In this watchfulnesss, this discernment, this justice, there are some things specially to be observed.
1. There is but one standard of truth. God fixes the standard and acts on it, without caprice, or partiality, or compromise. Error is a thousandfold,–pliable, moveable, uncertain,–truth is ONE. On this God calls on us to act, on this he acts himself. So that man cannot excuse his error or his falsehood on the ground that there were more standards than one.
2. This one standard is definite. It is not vague or shadowy. It does not merely settle certain great principles, but smaller ones as well. It is so very definite and precise as to leave man without excuse. It lets man know explicitly God’s present estimate of truth and falsehood, as well as his future judgment on these. It is so distinct that no one with an open ear and eye can hesitate about it. In our day men call this narrowness, bigotry, littleness. But if we only insist on being of one mind with God, he that condemns us condemns God himself. Let us be as broad as he is, but no broader; that is enough, whatever the age may say.
3. That one standard is universal. It is for every age and clime. It never becomes obsolete. It is like God himself,–unchangeable; like the Christ of God,–the same yesterday, today, and forever. It was given to our fathers, it is given to us. It suited the East, it suits the West. It suited the Jew, it suits the Gentile also; barbarian, Scythian, bond, or free. It suited the Asian, it suits the European. It suits the Briton, it suits the Indian, and the African. It suits the unlearned, it suits the learned too. One standard for all! One universal test or measurement of truth.
4. That one standard is the Bible. It is no secret standard that He judges us by, or by which He tests truth and error. The test which He gives to us He acts upon himself. The Bible is His book of truth as well as ours. That book contains what God calls truth,–truth definite, fixed, certain, not moveable, nor waxing obsolete, nor falling behind the age. The Bible is the one book of the age, nay, of the ages,–of all ages and all climes. Man’s present unbelief seeks to loosen its authority, to dilute its statements, to render indefinite its doctrines. But the word of the Lord endureth forever. God is not a man that he should lie. His word is sure, his truth is everlasting, his book is like the sun in the firmament; a light for all ages and lands.
Thus God’s eyes are on the truth. It is truth that he delights in, it is error that he abhors. It is truth that he is seeking for among the sons of men. What a condemnation to the laxity of thought in the present day! As if man were at liberty to think as he pleases, irrespective of God and his book! God watches over the truth; he marks each error, each deviation from his one standard.
True spirituality manifests itself in certain dominant desires. These are ever-present, deep-settled wants sufficiently powerful to motivate and control the life. For convenience let me number them, though I make no effort to decide the order of their importance. 1. First is the desire to be holy rather than happy. The yearning after happiness found so widely among Christians professing a superior degree of sanctity is sufficient proof that such sanctity is not indeed present. The truly spiritual man knows that God will give abundance of joy after we have become able to receive it without injury to our souls, but he does not demand it at once. John Wesley said of the members of one of the earliest Methodist societies that he doubted that they had been made perfect in love because they came to church to enjoy religion instead of to learn how they could become holy. 2. A man may be considered spiritual when he wants to see the honor of God advanced through his life even if it means that he himself must suffer temporary dishonor or loss. Such a man prays ?Hallowed be Thy name,? and silently adds, ?at any cost to me, Lord.? He lives for God?s honor by a kind of spiritual reflex. Every choice involving the glory of God is for him already made before it presents itself. He does not need to debate the matter with his own heart; there is nothing to debate. The glory of God is necessary to him; he gasps for it as a suffocating man gasps for air.
"Many people today don't want honest answers insofar as honest means unpleasant or disturbing, They want a soft answer that turneth away anxiety." - Louis Kronenberger
I am convinced that many evangelicals are not truly and soundly converted. Among the evangelicals it is entirely possible to come into membership, to ooze in by osmosis, to leak through the cells of the church and never know what it means to be born of the Spirit and washed in the blood. A great deal that passes for the deeper life is nothing more or less than basic Christianity. There is nothing deeper about it, and it is where we should have been from the start. We should have been happy, joyous, victorious Christians walking in the Holy Spirit and not fulfilling the lusts of the flesh. Instead we have been chasing each other around the perpetual mountain.
What we need is what the old Methodists called a sound conversion. There is a difference between conversion and a sound conversion. People who have never been soundly converted do not have the Spirit to enlighten them. When they read the Sermon on the Mount or the teaching passages of the epistles that tell them how to live or the doctrinal passages that tell how they can live, they are unaffected. The Spirit who wrote them is not witnessing in their hearts because they have not been born of the Spirit. That often happens.
If Satan opposes the new convert he opposes still more bitterly the Christian who is pressing on toward a higher life in Christ. The Spirit-filled life is not, as many suppose, a life of peace and quiet pleasure. It is likely to be something quite the opposite. Viewed one way it is a pilgrimage through a robber-infested forest; viewed another, it is a grim warfare with the devil. Always there is struggle, and sometimes there is a pitched battle with our own nature where the lines are so confused that it is all but impossible to locate the enemy or to tell which impulse is of the Spirit and which of the flesh. There is complete victory for us if we will but take the way of the triumphant Christ, but that is not what we are considering now. My point here is that if we want to escape the struggle we have but to draw back and accept the currently accepted low-keyed Christian life as the normal one. That is all Satan wants. That will ground our power, stunt our growth and render us harmless to the kingdom of darkness. Compromise will take the pressure off. Satan will not bother a man who has quit fighting. But the cost of quitting will be a life of peaceful stagnation. We sons of eternity just cannot afford such a thing.
Well....I have learned some very hard lessons today. My heart feels like it's bleeding from a big gaping hole. I know that what is being, has been removed by God's hand will be replaced with something beautiful and wonderful and perfect, for that I believe today I am being blessed...while painful to admit the horrible truth of myself, it's bearable because I know that God is with me through this and will heal me. It's going to be a process and take time, but this is where I find myself today...I need to heal, I need forgiveness, and I need to say I'm sorry to anyone and everyone I have hurt here.
It is time for us to repent, for our transgressions against the blessed Third Person have been many and much aggravated. We have bitterly mistreated Him in the house of His friends. We have crucified Him in His own temple as they crucified the Eternal Son on the hill above Jerusalem. And the nails we used were not of iron, but of the finer and more precious stuff of which human life is made. Out of our hearts we took the refined metals of will and feeling and thought, and from them we fashioned the nails of suspicion and rebellion and neglect. By unworthy thoughts about Him and unfriendly attitudes toward Him we grieved and quenched Him days without end.
The truest and most acceptable repentance is to reverse the acts and attitudes of which we repent....
We can best repent our neglect by neglecting Him no more. Let us begin to think of Him as One to be worshipped and obeyed. Let us throw open every door and invite Him in. Let us surrender to Him every room in the temple of our hearts and insist that He enter and occupy as Lord and Master within His own dwelling. The Pursuit of Man, 71-72.
I hear you Watchman...... I just read what you wrote below... I will be praying for you. And just so you know..... I am learning from you. Its so good to see the Lord front and center in a persons life no matter what and with no excuses. I care for you and I should show that more often.... I just don't know how.. that is all. <3
The truth is, dedication of the life to any thing or anyone short of God Himself, is a prostitution of noble powers and must bring a harvest of grief and disappointment at last. Only God is worthy of the soul He has made in His own image. To devote our lives to any cause, however worthy, is to sell ourselves short. Not money, position, fame, can justly claim our devotion. Art, literature, music also fall short. And, if God is forgotten, even the loftiest and most unselfish task is unworthy of the souls full surrender. Complete dedication unto death in the cause of freedom, for instance, is a touching thing and has given to history many of her greatest heroes, but only the God of freedom should have our last full measure of devotion. These are strenuous times and men are being recruited everywhere to devote themselves to one or another master. Let us be careful. No one has any true right to claim my life except the One who gave His own life for my redemption. If He gets my full dedication then I may engage in any good and worthy cause under His Spirit's guidance. But anything short of complete devotion to Christ is inadequate and must end in futility and loss.
"To employ soft words and honeyed phrases in discussing questions of everlasting importance; to deal with errors that strike at the foundations of all human hope as if they were harmless and venial mistakes; to bless where God disapproves, and to make apologies where He calls us to stand up like men and assert, though it may be the aptest method of securing popular applause in a sophistical age, is cruelty to man and treachery to Heaven. Those who on such subjects attach more importance to the rules of courtesy than they do to the measures of truth do not defend the citadel, but betray it into the hands of its enemies. Love for Christ, and for the souls for whom He died, will be the exact measure of our zeal in exposing the dangers by which men's souls are ensnared." - James Henry Thornwell
"The chief danger of the Church today is that it is trying to get on the same side as the world, instead of turning the world upside down. Our Master expects us to accomplish results, even if they bring opposition and conflict. Anything is better than compromise, apathy, and paralysis. God give to us an intense cry for the old-time power of the Gospel and the Holy Ghost." - A. B. Simpson (Preacher, pastor, writer, and promoter of foreign missions)
At 8:08am on September 28, 2014, thewatchman said…
Henry Stanley, a worldly reporter, was sent to the jungles of Africa in search of David Livingstone. The last time the old missionary had been seen was seven years before when he returned to Africa in 1865. Finally, when Stanley found Livingstone in the middle of nowhere, the encounter changed him completely.
Stanley lived with Livingstone for four months, sharing the same hut and every part of his life as well. He watched him closely and listened to his words. To his amazement, he could find no fault in this man. Up to that point, Stanley had been very critical of religion and even described himself as the worst infidel in London. But there in the jungle he encountered a man who simply lived out the words of Jesus: “Leave all and follow Me” (see Luke 18:22). Seeing Livingstone’s love, his zeal and his commitment, Stanley’s heart changed. “I was converted by him,” he wrote, “although he had not tried to do it.”
With all the frantic activities of modern-day Christianity, it is time for us to learn that it is not the plans we make or the programs that matter most, but the simple truth of letting His life flow through us.
At 9:04am on September 27, 2014, thewatchman said…
Forgiveness for the Past and Provision for the Present
. . . To offer a sinner the gift of salvation based upon the work of Christ, while at the same time allowing him to retain the idea that the gift carries with it no moral implications, is to do him untold injury where it hurts him worst. Many evangelical teachers insist so strongly upon free, unconditional grace as to create the impression that sin is not a serious matter and that God cares very little about it. He is concerned only with our escaping the consequences. The gospel then in practical application means little more than a way to escape the fruits of our past. The heart that has felt the weight of its own sin and along with this has seen the dread whiteness of the Most High God will never believe that a message of forgiveness without transformation is a message of good news. To remit a man's past without transforming his present is to violate the moral sincerity of his own heart. To that kind of thing God will be no party. We must have courage to preach the whole message. By so doing we shall undoubtedly lose a few friends and make a number of enemies. But the true Christian will not grieve too much about that. He has enough to do to please his Lord and Savior and to be true to the souls of all men. That may well occupy him too completely to leave much time for regrets over the displeasure of misguided men. ~A. W. TOZER~
At 6:39pm on September 26, 2014, thewatchman said…
Love Disposes Him
The world is full of enemies, and as long as we are subject to the possibility of harm from these enemies, fear is inevitable. The effort to conquer fear without removing the causes is altogether futile. The heart is wiser than the apostles of tranquility. As long as we are in the hands of chance, as long as we must look for hope to the law of averages, as long as we must trust for survival to our ability to outthink or outmaneuver the enemy, we have every good reason to be afraid. And fear hath torment.
To know that love is of God and to enter into the secret place leaning upon the arm of the Beloved—this and only this can cast out fear. Let a man become convinced that nothing can harm him and instantly for him all fear goes out of the universe. The nervous reflex, the natural revulsion to physical pain may be felt sometimes, but the deep torment of fear is gone forever. God is love and God is sovereign. His love disposes Him to desire our everlasting welfare and His sovereignty enables Him to secure it. Nothing can hurt a good man.
The body they may kill:
God's truth abideth still,
His kingdom is forever.
Martin Luther
Verse
There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.1 John 4:18
Thought
God’s love disposes Him to desire our everlasting welfare, and His sovereignty enables Him to secure it. Nothing can hurt a good man.
Prayer
We give thanks for the fact that Your love desires our everlasting welfare.
At 2:18pm on September 25, 2014, thewatchman said…
BETTER FARTHER ON
Truth that is not experienced is no better than error, and may be fully as dangerous. Remember that the scribes who sat in Moses' seat were not the victims of error; they were the victims of failure to experience the truth they taught! We should see that one of the greatest foes of the Christian is religious complacency. The man who believes that he has "arrived" will not go any further; and the present neat habit of quoting a text to prove we have arrived may be a dangerous one if in truth we have no actual inward experience of the text. The great saints of the past have all had yearning hearts. Their longing after God all but consumed them; it propelled them onward and upward to heights toward which less ardent Christians look with languid eye and entertain no hope of reaching. May we offer this word of exhortation: pray on, fight on, sing on! Press on into the deep things of God. Keep your feet on the ground, but let your heart soar as high as it will!
I can't figure out how to make a hyperlink. Oi! I put a copy of the essay on the Major Prophets in the blogs. It's under your blog where you asked about it.
Love,
Mary
At 5:43pm on September 21, 2014, thewatchman said…
You can't offend a man that's filled with the Spirit.
The darker it gets, the brighter your light will shine.
It's going to demand alot of courage before too long-- to really live and maintain the true Christian life according to the Word of the Living God.
Christ will not stand competition. This vain world should have no pull on us at any level at all.
You have no right to sin. If you have sin in your life, you've got something which is illegal in the sight of God; you're giving the devil a hand in your life.
You can't say, "Christ is all I need," until Christ is all you have.
Sin is abnormal in the Christian life.
Are you beyond the place where anyone can offend you?
If you're going to be a true Christian, I'll tel l you one thing amongst others: it'll be a lonely life. It's a narrow way and it becomes narrower and narrower and narrower.
He wants to get us to the place where we'd rather fast than feast; where we'd rather be unknown than known.
God didn't come to be a shareholder, forget it! God doesn't want to share your lif, He wants to own it! He doesn't want partnership, He wants ownership of every part of my being!
It's not simp1e being a Christian. After all, it's a majestic thing!
All you have to do is get in a closer walk with God and you'll find your enemies are in your own church.
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Continued from DIVINE JEALOUSY FOR THE TRUTH
O man, hast thou received the very truth, and the whole truth of God? He has given man a book for a standard, not that he may speculate, but that he may not speculate, but believe. What God, in and by that book, demands of men is not criticism, opinion, speculation, but BELIEF. God’s eyes are on the truth, to see if men believe it.
The day is at hand, the great day of the Lord, when TRUTH only shall be set on high, and error put to shame. O man, God’s eyes are on the truth, let thine be on it too. Be true to truth; be true to thyself; be true to God. ~HORATIUS BONAR~
-Taken from Light & Truth: Bible Thoughts and Themes, Vol. I, 1868.
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=24046
DIVINE JEALOUSY FOR THE TRUTH
“O Lord, are not thine eyes upon the truth?” –Jeremiah 5:3
The word “truth” in Scripture refers both to doctrine and practice. It points both to the “error” and the “lie.” It classes both together. It condemns both. False speaking, whether in reference to teaching or witness-bearing, is declared to be abominable to God. His eyes are upon the truth. They watch over it, to guard it and to maintain it.
The theory of many is that God’s eyes are not upon the truth, and that therefore a man may believe what he pleases, and say what he likes, without fearing God’s displeasure. It is only when the untrue thing which he thinks and says interferes with human rights, or social privileges that he is to be visited with punishment. Jehovah’s eyes, then, are upon the truth,–the truth as found on earth among the sons of men.
In this watchfulnesss, this discernment, this justice, there are some things specially to be observed.
1. There is but one standard of truth. God fixes the standard and acts on it, without caprice, or partiality, or compromise. Error is a thousandfold,–pliable, moveable, uncertain,–truth is ONE. On this God calls on us to act, on this he acts himself. So that man cannot excuse his error or his falsehood on the ground that there were more standards than one.
2. This one standard is definite. It is not vague or shadowy. It does not merely settle certain great principles, but smaller ones as well. It is so very definite and precise as to leave man without excuse. It lets man know explicitly God’s present estimate of truth and falsehood, as well as his future judgment on these. It is so distinct that no one with an open ear and eye can hesitate about it. In our day men call this narrowness, bigotry, littleness. But if we only insist on being of one mind with God, he that condemns us condemns God himself. Let us be as broad as he is, but no broader; that is enough, whatever the age may say.
3. That one standard is universal. It is for every age and clime. It never becomes obsolete. It is like God himself,–unchangeable; like the Christ of God,–the same yesterday, today, and forever. It was given to our fathers, it is given to us. It suited the East, it suits the West. It suited the Jew, it suits the Gentile also; barbarian, Scythian, bond, or free. It suited the Asian, it suits the European. It suits the Briton, it suits the Indian, and the African. It suits the unlearned, it suits the learned too. One standard for all! One universal test or measurement of truth.
4. That one standard is the Bible. It is no secret standard that He judges us by, or by which He tests truth and error. The test which He gives to us He acts upon himself. The Bible is His book of truth as well as ours. That book contains what God calls truth,–truth definite, fixed, certain, not moveable, nor waxing obsolete, nor falling behind the age. The Bible is the one book of the age, nay, of the ages,–of all ages and all climes. Man’s present unbelief seeks to loosen its authority, to dilute its statements, to render indefinite its doctrines. But the word of the Lord endureth forever. God is not a man that he should lie. His word is sure, his truth is everlasting, his book is like the sun in the firmament; a light for all ages and lands.
Thus God’s eyes are on the truth. It is truth that he delights in, it is error that he abhors. It is truth that he is seeking for among the sons of men. What a condemnation to the laxity of thought in the present day! As if man were at liberty to think as he pleases, irrespective of God and his book! God watches over the truth; he marks each error, each deviation from his one standard.
O man
GASPING FOR THE GLORY OF GOD
True spirituality manifests itself in certain dominant desires. These are ever-present, deep-settled wants sufficiently powerful to motivate and control the life. For convenience let me number them, though I make no effort to decide the order of their importance. 1. First is the desire to be holy rather than happy. The yearning after happiness found so widely among Christians professing a superior degree of sanctity is sufficient proof that such sanctity is not indeed present. The truly spiritual man knows that God will give abundance of joy after we have become able to receive it without injury to our souls, but he does not demand it at once. John Wesley said of the members of one of the earliest Methodist societies that he doubted that they had been made perfect in love because they came to church to enjoy religion instead of to learn how they could become holy. 2. A man may be considered spiritual when he wants to see the honor of God advanced through his life even if it means that he himself must suffer temporary dishonor or loss. Such a man prays ?Hallowed be Thy name,? and silently adds, ?at any cost to me, Lord.? He lives for God?s honor by a kind of spiritual reflex. Every choice involving the glory of God is for him already made before it presents itself. He does not need to debate the matter with his own heart; there is nothing to debate. The glory of God is necessary to him; he gasps for it as a suffocating man gasps for air.
~A.W. TOZER~
"Many people today don't want honest answers insofar as honest means unpleasant or disturbing, They want a soft answer that turneth away anxiety." - Louis Kronenberger
Sound Conversion
I am convinced that many evangelicals are not truly and soundly converted. Among the evangelicals it is entirely possible to come into membership, to ooze in by osmosis, to leak through the cells of the church and never know what it means to be born of the Spirit and washed in the blood. A great deal that passes for the deeper life is nothing more or less than basic Christianity. There is nothing deeper about it, and it is where we should have been from the start. We should have been happy, joyous, victorious Christians walking in the Holy Spirit and not fulfilling the lusts of the flesh. Instead we have been chasing each other around the perpetual mountain.
What we need is what the old Methodists called a sound conversion. There is a difference between conversion and a sound conversion. People who have never been soundly converted do not have the Spirit to enlighten them. When they read the Sermon on the Mount or the teaching passages of the epistles that tell them how to live or the doctrinal passages that tell how they can live, they are unaffected. The Spirit who wrote them is not witnessing in their hearts because they have not been born of the Spirit. That often happens.
~A. W. Tozer~
~
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=5962
VICTORS OR VICTIMS
If Satan opposes the new convert he opposes still more bitterly the Christian who is pressing on toward a higher life in Christ. The Spirit-filled life is not, as many suppose, a life of peace and quiet pleasure. It is likely to be something quite the opposite. Viewed one way it is a pilgrimage through a robber-infested forest; viewed another, it is a grim warfare with the devil. Always there is struggle, and sometimes there is a pitched battle with our own nature where the lines are so confused that it is all but impossible to locate the enemy or to tell which impulse is of the Spirit and which of the flesh. There is complete victory for us if we will but take the way of the triumphant Christ, but that is not what we are considering now. My point here is that if we want to escape the struggle we have but to draw back and accept the currently accepted low-keyed Christian life as the normal one. That is all Satan wants. That will ground our power, stunt our growth and render us harmless to the kingdom of darkness. Compromise will take the pressure off. Satan will not bother a man who has quit fighting. But the cost of quitting will be a life of peaceful stagnation. We sons of eternity just cannot afford such a thing.
~A.W. TOZER~
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=category&cid=2&page=18
Well....I have learned some very hard lessons today. My heart feels like it's bleeding from a big gaping hole. I know that what is being, has been removed by God's hand will be replaced with something beautiful and wonderful and perfect, for that I believe today I am being blessed...while painful to admit the horrible truth of myself, it's bearable because I know that God is with me through this and will heal me. It's going to be a process and take time, but this is where I find myself today...I need to heal, I need forgiveness, and I need to say I'm sorry to anyone and everyone I have hurt here.
Do not quench the Spirit. --1 Thessalonians 5:19
It is time for us to repent, for our transgressions against the blessed Third Person have been many and much aggravated. We have bitterly mistreated Him in the house of His friends. We have crucified Him in His own temple as they crucified the Eternal Son on the hill above Jerusalem. And the nails we used were not of iron, but of the finer and more precious stuff of which human life is made. Out of our hearts we took the refined metals of will and feeling and thought, and from them we fashioned the nails of suspicion and rebellion and neglect. By unworthy thoughts about Him and unfriendly attitudes toward Him we grieved and quenched Him days without end.
The truest and most acceptable repentance is to reverse the acts and attitudes of which we repent....
We can best repent our neglect by neglecting Him no more. Let us begin to think of Him as One to be worshipped and obeyed. Let us throw open every door and invite Him in. Let us surrender to Him every room in the temple of our hearts and insist that He enter and occupy as Lord and Master within His own dwelling. The Pursuit of Man, 71-72.
"Forgive me. Change me. Indwell me. Control me. Amen." ....And Amen
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=16416
I hear you Watchman...... I just read what you wrote below... I will be praying for you. And just so you know..... I am learning from you. Its so good to see the Lord front and center in a persons life no matter what and with no excuses. I care for you and I should show that more often.... I just don't know how.. that is all. <3
Isaiah 42:21--
The LORD is well pleased for his righteousness' sake; he will magnify the law, and make it honourable.
Completely Dedicated to Christ: Are We?
The truth is, dedication of the life to any thing or anyone short of God Himself, is a prostitution of noble powers and must bring a harvest of grief and disappointment at last. Only God is worthy of the soul He has made in His own image. To devote our lives to any cause, however worthy, is to sell ourselves short. Not money, position, fame, can justly claim our devotion. Art, literature, music also fall short. And, if God is forgotten, even the loftiest and most unselfish task is unworthy of the souls full surrender. Complete dedication unto death in the cause of freedom, for instance, is a touching thing and has given to history many of her greatest heroes, but only the God of freedom should have our last full measure of devotion. These are strenuous times and men are being recruited everywhere to devote themselves to one or another master. Let us be careful. No one has any true right to claim my life except the One who gave His own life for my redemption. If He gets my full dedication then I may engage in any good and worthy cause under His Spirit's guidance. But anything short of complete devotion to Christ is inadequate and must end in futility and loss.
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=5355
"To employ soft words and honeyed phrases in discussing questions of everlasting importance; to deal with errors that strike at the foundations of all human hope as if they were harmless and venial mistakes; to bless where God disapproves, and to make apologies where He calls us to stand up like men and assert, though it may be the aptest method of securing popular applause in a sophistical age, is cruelty to man and treachery to Heaven. Those who on such subjects attach more importance to the rules of courtesy than they do to the measures of truth do not defend the citadel, but betray it into the hands of its enemies. Love for Christ, and for the souls for whom He died, will be the exact measure of our zeal in exposing the dangers by which men's souls are ensnared." - James Henry Thornwell
"The chief danger of the Church today is that it is trying to get on the same side as the world, instead of turning the world upside down. Our Master expects us to accomplish results, even if they bring opposition and conflict. Anything is better than compromise, apathy, and paralysis. God give to us an intense cry for the old-time power of the Gospel and the Holy Ghost." - A. B. Simpson (Preacher, pastor, writer, and promoter of foreign missions)
Henry Stanley, a worldly reporter, was sent to the jungles of Africa in search of David Livingstone. The last time the old missionary had been seen was seven years before when he returned to Africa in 1865. Finally, when Stanley found Livingstone in the middle of nowhere, the encounter changed him completely.
Stanley lived with Livingstone for four months, sharing the same hut and every part of his life as well. He watched him closely and listened to his words. To his amazement, he could find no fault in this man. Up to that point, Stanley had been very critical of religion and even described himself as the worst infidel in London. But there in the jungle he encountered a man who simply lived out the words of Jesus: “Leave all and follow Me” (see Luke 18:22). Seeing Livingstone’s love, his zeal and his commitment, Stanley’s heart changed. “I was converted by him,” he wrote, “although he had not tried to do it.”
With all the frantic activities of modern-day Christianity, it is time for us to learn that it is not the plans we make or the programs that matter most, but the simple truth of letting His life flow through us.
Don’t let it end. The journey continues . . .
~K.P. YOHANNAN~
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=29149
Forgiveness for the Past and Provision for the Present
. . . To offer a sinner the gift of salvation based upon the work of Christ, while at the same time allowing him to retain the idea that the gift carries with it no moral implications, is to do him untold injury where it hurts him worst. Many evangelical teachers insist so strongly upon free, unconditional grace as to create the impression that sin is not a serious matter and that God cares very little about it. He is concerned only with our escaping the consequences. The gospel then in practical application means little more than a way to escape the fruits of our past. The heart that has felt the weight of its own sin and along with this has seen the dread whiteness of the Most High God will never believe that a message of forgiveness without transformation is a message of good news. To remit a man's past without transforming his present is to violate the moral sincerity of his own heart. To that kind of thing God will be no party. We must have courage to preach the whole message. By so doing we shall undoubtedly lose a few friends and make a number of enemies. But the true Christian will not grieve too much about that. He has enough to do to please his Lord and Savior and to be true to the souls of all men. That may well occupy him too completely to leave much time for regrets over the displeasure of misguided men.
~A. W. TOZER~
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=5324
Love Disposes Him
The world is full of enemies, and as long as we are subject to the possibility of harm from these enemies, fear is inevitable. The effort to conquer fear without removing the causes is altogether futile. The heart is wiser than the apostles of tranquility. As long as we are in the hands of chance, as long as we must look for hope to the law of averages, as long as we must trust for survival to our ability to outthink or outmaneuver the enemy, we have every good reason to be afraid. And fear hath torment.
To know that love is of God and to enter into the secret place leaning upon the arm of the Beloved—this and only this can cast out fear. Let a man become convinced that nothing can harm him and instantly for him all fear goes out of the universe. The nervous reflex, the natural revulsion to physical pain may be felt sometimes, but the deep torment of fear is gone forever. God is love and God is sovereign. His love disposes Him to desire our everlasting welfare and His sovereignty enables Him to secure it. Nothing can hurt a good man.
The body they may kill:
God's truth abideth still,
His kingdom is forever.
Martin Luther
Verse
There is no fear in love. But perfect love drives out fear, because fear has to do with punishment.1 John 4:18
Thought
God’s love disposes Him to desire our everlasting welfare, and His sovereignty enables Him to secure it. Nothing can hurt a good man.
Prayer
We give thanks for the fact that Your love desires our everlasting welfare.
https://www.cmalliance.org/devotions/tozer
BETTER FARTHER ON
Truth that is not experienced is no better than error, and may be fully as dangerous. Remember that the scribes who sat in Moses' seat were not the victims of error; they were the victims of failure to experience the truth they taught! We should see that one of the greatest foes of the Christian is religious complacency. The man who believes that he has "arrived" will not go any further; and the present neat habit of quoting a text to prove we have arrived may be a dangerous one if in truth we have no actual inward experience of the text. The great saints of the past have all had yearning hearts. Their longing after God all but consumed them; it propelled them onward and upward to heights toward which less ardent Christians look with languid eye and entertain no hope of reaching. May we offer this word of exhortation: pray on, fight on, sing on! Press on into the deep things of God. Keep your feet on the ground, but let your heart soar as high as it will!
http://www.sermonindex.net/modules/articles/index.php?view=article&aid=4726
I can't figure out how to make a hyperlink. Oi! I put a copy of the essay on the Major Prophets in the blogs. It's under your blog where you asked about it.
Love,
Mary
You can't offend a man that's filled with the Spirit.
The darker it gets, the brighter your light will shine.
It's going to demand alot of courage before too long-- to really live and maintain the true Christian life according to the Word of the Living God.
Christ will not stand competition. This vain world should have no pull on us at any level at all.
You have no right to sin. If you have sin in your life, you've got something which is illegal in the sight of God; you're giving the devil a hand in your life.
You can't say, "Christ is all I need," until Christ is all you have.
Sin is abnormal in the Christian life.
Are you beyond the place where anyone can offend you?
If you're going to be a true Christian, I'll tel l you one thing amongst others: it'll be a lonely life. It's a narrow way and it becomes narrower and narrower and narrower.
He wants to get us to the place where we'd rather fast than feast; where we'd rather be unknown than known.
God didn't come to be a shareholder, forget it! God doesn't want to share your lif, He wants to own it! He doesn't want partnership, He wants ownership of every part of my being!
It's not simp1e being a Christian. After all, it's a majestic thing!
All you have to do is get in a closer walk with God and you'll find your enemies are in your own church.
~Leonard Ravenhill~
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