Renewed ~ Day By Day ~ Devotional

January 1God Is Always First—and Will Surely Be LastI am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the ending, saith the Lord. Revelation 1:8GOD IS ALWAYS FIRST, and God will surely be last!\tIn the plan of God, man is never permitted to utter the first word nor the last. That is the prerogative of the Deity, and one which He will never surrender to His creatures.\tMan has no say about the time or the place of his birth; God determines that without consulting the man himself. One day the little man finds himself in consciousness and accepts the fact that he is. There his volitional life begins.\tBefore that he had nothing to say about anything.\tAfter that he struts and boasts, and encouraged by the sound of his own voice he may declare his independence of God.\tHave your fun, little man; you are only chattering in the interim between first and last. You had no voice at the first and you will have none at the last!\tGod reserves the right to take up at the last where He began at the first, and you are in the hands of God whether you will or not.\tAdam became a living soul but that becoming was not of his own volition. It was God who willed it and who executed His will in making Adam a living soul. God was there first!\tAnd when Adam sinned and wrecked his whole life, God was there still. Adam’s whole future peace lay in this—that God was still there after he had sinned.\tIt would be great wisdom for us to begin to live in the light of this wonderful and terrible truth: God is the first and the last!

Remarkable comforting to find out about the mark of the High Priest and true piestliness – still there, when things have gone wrong, able to put things in order, pursuing His eternal purpose amidst impossibilities, having a word of finality ready to be sent.

After reading Mike’s and Lars’ posts, I was reminded of Austin-Sparks’ opening up of Hebrews 7:25 in his A Saviour to the Uttermost. A rare gem:A Saviour To The Uttermostby T. Austin-Sparks"Wherefore also He is able to save to the uttermost them that draw near unto God through Him, seeing He ever liveth to make intercession for them" (Heb. 7:25; RV). Howsoever viewed, this is a great and heartening statement. The ability of our Lord Jesus Christ to save at all times and in all circumstances is the sheet anchor of the faith of God's people. A Saviour who never fails, who can never be confronted with a situation too difficult for Him, is a fundamental necessity to all who are seeking to live to the glory of God in an end time, and who are, therefore, continually meeting the fierce and unceasing antagonism of the forces of darkness. Here the glorious declaration of His power to save to the uttermost is made for our comfort, and for the strengthening of faith. We shall look at this in two ways: firstly, regarding it as a statement by itself and seeking to gather its rich and full meaning; then looking at it in its context and noting the immense reinforcement that is brought to faith as the statement is seen to be the culminating point of one section of the whole great argument concerning the person and work of Jesus our Lord. (1) The Great Statement This is a favourite text for evangelistic sermons. It is indeed "good news" for the sinner. No one, however sunken in sin, is beyond the reach of His saving power. He is able to save all who come, and to save them to the uttermost. Let the message go out to the furthest bounds of human sin and need, and be sounded in the ears of the most hardened and degraded of the sons of men. No case is too hard for Him. Hallelujah! But this is written as a message to the Lord's people. It is a glorious declaration of His saving power in relation to those who draw near to God, and is based, not only upon His death on Calvary, but upon His present life and ministry as the High Priest of His people. It is because "He ever liveth" that "He is able to save to the uttermost" (or completely - RVM). This is the gospel for the saints. What a joy to declare it! The more dire the need (and some of the Lord's people are in desperate need) the greater the comfort of the declaration. What a consolation to the heart, when involved in some situation of acute, and humanly hopeless, difficulty, to remember that, interceding for us at the right hand of Divine power, we have One Who, because He ever liveth, is able to exercise saving power to the full range and depth of an uttermost need: and not only able but willing to save, and in the bitterest trial to "make a way to escape that ye may be able to bear it". To trust Him is to find salvation. "They who trust Him wholly find Him wholly true." "To the uttermost." This is a translation of a very rich original word. Like many of the words God employs in Holy Scripture it is a word with a big content. Someone has truly said that the words the Holy Spirit uses are great words in that they have God behind them. They are often much bigger than we realize. This word combines two separate ideas; first that of quality, then that of reach. It speaks of His ability to save completely in the present, and also to go on saving thus for ever; fullness of resource for present need, however dire, and also for every future need to the end of our earthly history. It may be expressed thus: Whatever the depth and complexity of present need, in whatsoever realm that need may be, whether in spirit, soul, or body; in Him, as exalted at God's right hand, there is complete ability to meet it: and further, by no possibility can there arise a situation to the farthest reach of time where that ability will be diminished, or His saving power be other than an abiding reality. We are living in days when the outlook for this world is gloomy indeed and when fear might well grip the heart, even of the believer. No man knows what is going to happen today, or tomorrow, still less the day after. Fear is gripping the hearts of men everywhere. Many of the Lord's people are afraid that they will become involved in some situation beyond the power of human endurance. Many in war-torn lands are going through trials and sufferings which strain endurance to the breaking point. Not a few, even in peaceful lands like our own, are tried in circumstance or physical suffering which seems to be beyond measure. How shall such endure to the end and be joyful in the midst of their tribulations? Only by an experience of His saving power, entered into on the basis of faith in His ever-present and never-diminishing ability to make His salvation a glorious reality. Faith asserts in the face of the most extreme difficulty and of human impossibility: "He ever liveth! He is able to save to the uttermost!" This is true in every realm of human need. Whether the problem be related to sin, self, the world, the Devil, or to death and him who wields it as a potent weapon, the power of an uttermost salvation resides in our Priestly Intercessor on the Father's throne. Fearful heart, take comfort: He ever liveth! He is there in the full value of His Calvary triumph. Nothing has been lost in the process of the years. All that He won as the mighty victor in the hour of His weakness and seeming defeat, He holds on our behalf. It is all available to faith. "And now He livesProclaim the joyful story, the Lord's on high; And we in Him are raised to endless glory And ne'er shall die." Death has no dominion over Him, nor can we be brought under the power of it while we keep Him in full view. He lives, and has said, "Because I live, ye shall live also." Living, He is abundantly able to save. (2) The Statement In Its Setting The comfort, consolation, and strength-giving power of this declaration, are immensely reinforced as we view it in its context, and see it as the culmination of a great argument. We miss a great deal of the value of the Word of God by our habit of reading short portions or single chapters. It is always worthwhile to take time to see the scope and range of the particular book we are reading, to note its divisions, apprehend its arguments, and see where the climaxes come. The 'wherefores' and 'therefores' of the Word are most helpful in this connection. They always cast us back on that which has preceded the passage in question and indicate the foundation of the statement made. So this great declaration of the unceasing ability of the Lord to minister an uttermost salvation commences with "Wherefore". That is linked in the first place with verse 24: "But He, because He abideth for ever, hath His priesthood unchangeable" (Hebrews 7). This, in turn, is the culmination of the whole argument concerning our Lord's priestly ministry in contrast with the Aaronic priesthood of the old economy. It will help if we seek to see something of the scope and range of the Epistle to the Hebrews. It was written to Hebrew believers; men who had been reared in the old Mosaic order of things, with its outward and visible worship, its sacrifices and priesthood, laws and ordinances. All this was passing away before their eyes and they had not yet become fully alive to the inward and essentially spiritual character of that into which they had entered as they passed out of Judaism into the Christian Church. Hence the Holy Spirit was seeking to demonstrate to them the immense superiority of Christ, in every aspect of His person and work, as contrasted with the old order of things and the leaders they held in reverence. The key word of the Epistle is "better". There is a better hope, a better testament, better promises, better sacrifices, a better resurrection, a better country, etc. Firstly, then, the Lord Jesus is declared to be God's final message to men (chapter 1:1-2) and as such is superior to the angels and messengers through whom the old covenant was given (chapters 1 and 2). Then He is placed in contrast with Moses, the revered leader of the people from Egypt to Canaan, and the one through whom the Law was given. Christ is shown to be superior to Moses inasmuch as, in God's house, the Son is superior to one who, however great, was after all but a servant (chapter 3:1-6). Joshua takes up the position of national leader on the death of Moses and conducts the people into the promised land; but though he gives them a large measure of possession, he was not able to give them rest therein. Our Lord is shown to be superior to Joshua in that He is able to lead His people into 'the rest that remaineth to the people of God' (chapter 4:8-10). Then comes the long section dealing with the great matter of priesthood, commencing with chapter 4:14 and going through to chapter 10. Christ as High Priest after the order of Melchizedek is set forth in contrast to the Aaronic priesthood, and the superiority of His office and ministry is found to consist in the fact that, whereas the priests of old were men whose lives were short and their ministry constantly interrupted by death, He lives by the power of an endless life and hath an unchangeable and age-abiding ministry. The great declaration in relation to His priesthood is a twofold one (chapter 5:5-6).1. "Thou art My Son, this day have I begotten Thee." 2. "Thou art a Priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek." And, further, this declaration is confirmed by God's oath:"The Lord sware and will not repent Himself, Thou art a Priest for ever..." (chapter 7:21).Priesthood is an office, but one based upon moral suitability, upon sonship. The priests of the old Aaronic order were able to deal gently with the ignorant and the erring, because they themselves were compassed with infirmity, and therefore were compelled to offer sacrifice, not only for the sins of the people, but also for their own. They had the power of sympathy strongly developed because of their personal experience. Our glorious High Priest was sinless and needed not to offer sacrifice on His own behalf. Nevertheless His power of sympathetic understanding is in no wise inferior to that of Aaron and his successors. Though He was a Son, He entered into the school of suffering and therein "learned obedience". He came to His perfection as Man, and therefore to His suitability for the high-priestly office, along the road of discipline: it was not that there was ever in Him a disposition towards disobedience. But it is one thing to be disposed to obedience and another to learn what obedience really means in the discipline of life. His delight in the will of God, declared when He came into the world, must be proved by treading the thorny road of life in dependence and active obedience. As another has well said, "The progress from the disposition to the deed of obedience is a practical learning of the virtue of obedience." So having come to His perfection along this difficult and painful road, He not only "became the Author of eternal salvation to all them that obey Him," but is able fully to sympathize with those obedient souls in all the trials and conflicts they endure, as they also tread the hard road leading to their perfection. The fullness of His experience, gathered in the school of suffering, and the certainty of His moral suitability to be the unchanging High Priest of His people, is seen in the fact that God, in making the double declaration, "Thou art My Son... Thou art a Priest for ever," confirmed His appointment to the priestly office with an oath. Now this is a remarkable thing. It is an altogether new note in relation to priesthood. The priestly order of the old dispensation was of Divine origin, but God never spake of it in terms like this. What is involved in this really startling statement? The purpose for which God employed this surprising method is clearly stated in chapter 6 with reference to Abraham: "For men sware by the greater: and in every dispute of theirs the oath is final for confirmation. Wherein God, being minded to shew more abundantly... the immutability of His counsel, interposed with an oath; that by two immutable things, in which it was impossible for God to lie, we may have a strong encouragement, who have fled for refuge to lay hold of the hope set before us" (Heb. 6:16-18; RV). The oath of God was taken for the strong encouragement of the heirs of promise. Here then is finality and unchangeability. God has sworn by Himself and will not repent. "Thou art a Priest for ever." Here is a fact altogether beyond the reach of the rebel forces in the universe, one which nothing in heaven or hell can change. After the order of him who was without genealogy, having neither beginning of days nor end of life, our blessed Lord, "the Man Christ Jesus," having entered as our forerunner within the veil, "abideth a Priest continually". Having reached this great climax in chapter 7:24-25, and making the declaration that, because Christ abideth ever and hath an unchangeable priesthood, He is able to save to the uttermost, the writer sums the matter up thus:-"Now in the things which we are saying the chief point is this: We have such a High Priest, Who sat down on the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, a Minister of the sanctuary, and of the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, not man" (Heb. 8:1-2; RV). Two points are to be noted. (1) He sat down. (2) He is a Minister of the sanctuary. Priests of the Aaronic order never sat down in the sanctuary: their work was never completed; the same sacrifices had to be offered year by year continually. But our High Priest offered one sacrifice for sins for ever. Having made propitiation for sins, He has passed through the heavens and is seated on the Father's throne. He is King as well as Priest. He is in the place of supreme and universal power. At the right hand of the throne of the Majesty in the heavens, all authority is committed into His hands. The work of redemption is finished. The claims of Divine righteousness are fully satisfied. His victory over the rebel forces is full and final. In Him everything in the purpose and program of God has been secured. But all that has to be made good in the experience of 'the people for His Name' who are being gathered out from the nations of the world, and who, in the wonderfully gracious purpose of God are to share His throne in the coming kingdom. He is their representative, their forerunner, but they have not arrived where He is. Hence we have the paradoxical statement that, though He has sat down, He is none the less a Minister of the sanctuary. He is in full activity as the High Priest of His people, perpetually ministering on their behalf before God, in order that they may be maintained in their heavenly life, and may overcome all resistance even as He overcame. It is His ceaseless and untiring ministry in "the true tabernacle, which the Lord pitched, and not man," that is the ground of His people's sure confidence and triumphant boldness. "He ever liveth to make intercession." His ministry is a twofold one. On the one hand He maintains us before God by the virtue of all that He is in Himself, and by the value of His atoning sacrifice in all its range and power; and, on the other hand, He mediates to us of His fullness continually, so that as we 'draw near with boldness to the throne of grace, we find grace to help in every time of need.' Thus we are able constantly to experience His ability to save to the uttermost. There is no reason why we should be fearful in any circumstance, or despair in any situation of acute and desperate need. If we are conscious of uttermost need, He is presented to faith as an uttermost Saviour, on the basis of God's immutable oath. He is Redeemer, Saviour, High Priest, and Sovereign Lord. We have such a High Priest. Let us evermore rejoice in what He is in Himself, where He is in His Sovereign Lordship, and what He is doing in that tireless ministry on our behalf in the very presence of God."The Lord sware and will not repent, Thou art a Priest for ever..." He is able to save to the uttermost. Hallelujah!From "A Witness And A Testimony" March-April, 1939Available at austin-sparks.netRoger

January 2Jesus Christ Is All That the Godhead IsBut of him are Ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. 1 Corinthians 1:30I ADVISE YOU NOT TO LISTEN TO those who spend their time demeaning the person of Christ.\tI advise you to look beyond the cloudiness of modern terms used by those who themselves are not sure who Jesus Christ was in reality.\tYou cannot trust the man who can only say, “I believe that God revealed Himself through Christ.” Find out what he really believes about the person of the incarnate Son of God!\tYou cannot trust the man who will only say that Christ reflected more of God than other men do. Neither can you trust those who teach that Jesus Christ was the supreme religious genius, having the ability to catch and reflect more of God than any other man.\tAll of these approaches are insults to the Person of Jesus Christ. He was and is and can never cease to be God, and when we find Him and know Him, we are back at the ancient fountain again.\tChrist is all that the Godhead is!\tThis is the wonder, the great miracle—that by one swift, decisive, considered act of faith and prayer, our souls go back to the ancient fountain of our being, and we start over again!\tIt is in Jesus Christ Himself that we find our source, our satisfaction. I think this is what John Newton perceived in the miracle of the new birth, causing him to sing, “Now rest my long-divided heart, fixed on this blissful center—rest!”

January 3Holy Spirit: God in Contact with His CreaturesThe Spirit of truth, who proceedeth from the Father, he shall testify of me. John 15:26IF I READ ARIGHT THE RECORD of Christian experience through the years, those who most enjoyed the power of the Spirit of God have had the least to say about Him by way of attempted definition.\tThe Bible saints who walked in the Spirit never tried to explain Him. In post-biblical times many who were filled and possessed by the Spirit were by the limitations of their literary gifts prevented from telling us much about Him. They had no gift for self-analysis, but lived from within in uncritical simplicity.\tTo them the Spirit was One to be loved and fellowshipped the same as the Lord Jesus Himself. They would have been lost completely in any metaphysical discussion of the nature of the Spirit, but they had no trouble in claiming the power of the Spirit for holy living and fruitful service.\tThis is as it should be. Personal experience must always be first in real life. Knowledge by acquaintance is always better than knowledge by description, and the first does not presuppose the second nor require it.\tWhat we have in the Christian doctrine of the Holy Spirit is Deity present among us.\tHe is not God’s messenger only—He is God!\tHe is God in contact with His creatures, doing in them and among them a saving and renewing work.

January 4The Spirit of Man Makes Him a Human BeingFor what man knoweth the things of a man, save the spirit of man which is in him? Even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God. 1 Corinthians 2:11DEEP INSIDE EVERY MAN there is a private sanctum where dwells the mysterious essence of his being. It is the man’s “I am,” a gift from the I AM who created him.\tThe I AM which is God is underived and self-existent; the “I am” which is man is derived from God and dependent every moment upon His creative fiat for its continued existence. One is the Creator, high over all, ancient of days, dwelling in light unapproachable. The other is a creature and, though privileged beyond all others, is still but a creature, a pensioner on God’s bounty and a suppliant before His throne!\tThe deep-in human entity of which we speak is called in the Scriptures “the spirit of man.” Paul told the Corinthian church: “For what man knoweth the things of: man, save the spirit of man which is in him! even so the things of God knoweth no man, but the Spirit of God.”\tAs God’s self-knowledge lies in the eternal Spirit, so man’s self-knowledge is by his own spirit, and his knowledge of God is by the direct impression of the Spirit of God upon the spirit of man. This reveals the essential spirituality of mankind.\tIt also denies that man is a creature having a spirit and boldly declares that he is a spirit having a body!\tThat which makes man a human being is not his body but his spirit, in which the image of God originally lay.

January 5Do Not Mistake the True Meaning of the CrossBut God forbid that I should glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, by whom the world is crucified unto me, and I unto the world. Galatians 6:14ALL UNANNOUNCED AND MOSTLY UNDETECTED there has come in modern times a new cross into popular evangelical circles.\tIt is like the old cross, but different: the likenesses are superficial, the differences fundamental!\tFrom this new cross has sprung a new philosophy of the Christian life with encouragement for a new and entirely different evangelistic approach. The evangelist tries to show that Christianity makes no unpleasant demands; rather, it offers the same thing the world does, only on a higher level. The modern view is that the new cross does not slay the sinner, it redirects him!\tThe philosophy back of this kind of thing may be sincere, but it is as false as it is blind. It misses completely the whole meaning of the cross.\tThe old cross is a symbol of death. It stands for the abrupt, violent end of a human being. In Roman times, the man who took up his cross and started down the road was not coming back. He was not going out to have his life redirected: he was going out to have it ended! The cross 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!\tThe race of Adam is under death sentence. God cannot approve any of the fruits of sin. In coming to Christ we do not bring our old life up onto a higher plane; we leave it at the cross. Thus God salvages the individual by liquidating him and then raising him again to newness of life!

From this new cross has sprung a new philosophy of the Christian life with encouragement for a new and entirely different evangelistic approach. The evangelist tries to show that Christianity makes no unpleasant demands; rather, it offers the same thing the world does, only on a higher level. The modern view is that the new cross does not slay the sinner, it redirects him!wow, I was just thinking this morning about (again) the best selling Christian books out there. And what he said here was pretty much my conclusion. I think people want a motivational speaker, they want to be able to be taught how to have a nice, happy christian life with no trials or tribulations. I guess they think there is something wrong with themselves if they are not on cloud 9 all the time. Who's fault is this- that they think this? Well, ultimately it's the enemy's but aren't the leaders (pastors, writers, etc...)also partly responsible. I know we are each responsible for our own actions but still it does say that pastors, leaders, shepherds will be judged more harshly because of this.

Quote:“Who’s fault is this- that they think this? Well, ultimately it's the enemy's but aren't the leaders (pastors, writers, etc...)also partly responsible. I know we are each responsible for our own actions but still it does say that pastors, leaders, shepherds will be judged more harshly because of this.” 1. The publishers and retailers bear responsibility, too. There is such a thing as spiritual discernment, and a darkness, a spiritual blindness, has settled over this whole Christian book matter.The prophets cried out to Elisha, “O thou man of God, there is death in the pot.” And they could not eat thereof. 2. Hear what Paris Reidhead says about what Tozer calls “the new cross”:“Religion had to exist because there were so many people that made their living at it, so they had to find some way to justify their existence.”“Humanism says ‘the chief end of being is the happiness of man’. Humanism is like a miasma out of a pit, it just permeates everyplace. Humanism is like an infection, an epidemic, it just goes everywhere.”“Humanism is, I believe, the most deadly and disastrous of all the philosophical stenches that's crept up through the grating over the pit of Hell. It has penetrated so much of our religion. And it is in utter and total contrast to Christianity! Unfortunately it's seldom seen. And here we find Micah, wants to have a little chapel, and he wants to have a priest, and he wants to have prayer, and he wants to have devotion, because "I know the Lord will do me good!” And this is selfishness! And this is sin! And the Levite comes along and falls right in with it! Because he wants a place! He wants ten shekels and a shirt and his food! And so in order that he can have what he wants, and Micah can have what they want, They sell out God! For ten shekels and a shirt. And this is the betrayal of the ages! And it is the betrayal in which we live. And I don't see how God can revive it! Until we come back to Christianity. As in direct and total contrast with the stenchful humanism that's perpetuated in our generation in the name of Christ.“I'm afraid that it's become so subtle that it goes everywhere. What is it? In essence it's this! That this philosophical postulate that the end of all being is the happiness of man, has been sort of covered over with evangelical terms and Biblical doctrine until God reigns in heaven for the happiness of man, Jesus Christ was incarnate for the happiness of man, all the angels exist in the..., Everything is for the happiness of man! And I submit to you that this is unchristian!“Isn't man happy? Didn't God intend to make man happy?” Yes. But as a by-product and not a prime-product!”3. A few other remarks:Lars has posted extensively on this website about the anguish and the anguished cry that proceeds out of the heart of the authentic priest as the priest contemplates the condition of the Lord’s people as well as the lost of the world, and he has quoted extensively from Art Katz’ labors.Some time ago Art Katz delivered a powerful message on The Old Cross and the New Cross, and he titled it “And They Crucified Him”. It’s available on this site to download. I have transcribed the message, and I’ll be posting it in consecutive installments in the days to come as a Forum topic – And They Crucified Him.4.What can be done about this condition among God’s people concerning which Tozer, Reihead, Ravenhill, Wilkerson and others have cried out?5. Permit me a personal observation: After thirty years of living in an atmosphere of “new cross Christianity, I’m persuaded that the Lord’s people in general, and new converts in particular, need to be better instructed in the Letters to the Romans and to the Hebrews regarding the meaning and spiritual substance of Baptism and helped to understand the nature and reality of the New Covenant (as well as the substance of the Lord’s Table).Regarding the New Covenant, Andrew Murray’s expositional and devotional The Holiest of All (Whitaker House Publ.) is without equal for understanding the Hebrews letter.Concerning Baptism, Watchman Nee’s The Normal Christian Life is a good place to begin, dealing with the fifth through eighth chapters of Romans.Finally, Ron Bailey’s 4 Part series on Baptism, 3 Part series dealing with the Old Man, the New Man and The Power of Sin Broken in “The Truth As It Is In Jesus” series, and the 2 part series on Romans 5 are worth anyone’s precious time. Some of his work may be found on this site and some at www.biblebased.co.uk

“Humanism is, I believe, the most deadly and disastrous of all the philosophical stenches that's crept up through the grating over the pit of Hell. It has penetrated so much of our religion.“I'm afraid that it's become so subtle that it goes everywhere."Crept", "Subtle", maybe we could add "erosion", "blindness", "counterfit".Snakelike?

January 6The Bible: More Than a Volume of FactsAll scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness. 2 Timothy 3:16CHARLES G. FINNEY BELIEVED that Bible teaching without moral application could be worse than no teaching at all and could result in positive injury to the hearers. I used to feel that this might be an extreme position, but after years of observation have come around to it, or to a view almost identical with it.\tThere is scarcely anything so dull and meaningless as Bible doctrine taught for its own sake. Theology is a set of facts concerning God, man and the world. These facts may be and often are set forth as values in themselves; and there lies the snare both for the teacher and for the hearer.\tThe Bible is more than a volume of hitherto unknown facts about God, man and the universe. It is a book of exhortation based upon these facts. By far the greater portion of the book is devoted to an urgent effort to persuade people to alter their ways and bring their lives into harmony with the will of God as set forth in its pages.\tActually, no man is better for knowing that God in the beginning created the heaven and the earth. The devil knows that, and so did Ahab and Judas Iscariot. No man is better for knowing that God so loved the world of men that He gave His only begotten Son to die for their redemption. In hell there are millions who know that.\tTheological truth is useless until it is obeyed. The purpose behind all doctrine is to secure moral action!

January 7The Flock of God: Safe in Jesus ChristFeed the flock of God which is among you And when the chief Shepherd shall appear, ye shall receive a crown of glory that fadeth not away. 1 Peter 5:2, 4THE PEOPLE WHO WANT TO KNOW GOD and walk with God, those who have learned to recognize the voice of the good Shepherd, will always be at home in a Spirit-filled congregation.\tIt is sad indeed that some have never heard the voice of the Shepherd. His voice is as tender as a lullaby and as strong as the wind and as mighty as the sound of many waters. The people who have learned to hear and recognize the voice of Jesus—that healing, musical, solemn, beautiful voice of Jesus in His church—are always at home where everything centers around Him.\tThe true Christian church can be a conglomeration of everything under the sun. That is, we may have Calvinists and Arminians and Methodists and Baptists and all sorts of others, and yet we are all together on one thing—Jesus Christ is wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption! He is All in all, and the people of the Lord who have learned to hear the voice of the Shepherd gravitate towards that kind of church!\tThey may not be so sure about who else is present, but they know the Lord is present and they are sensitive to that.\tDo you find your own heart sensitive to the Lord’s presence or are you among those who are “samplers” and “nibblers”? God help you if you are, for the child of the king is a sheep who loves his Shepherd and he stays close to Him! That’s the only safe place for a sheep. Stay close to Jesus and all of the wolves in the world cannot get a tooth in you!

January 8True Worship: Fully Seeking the Lord We AdoreO come let us worship and bow down Psalm 95:6AN OLD CREED SAYS THAT WE WORSHIP one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth and of all things visible and invisible.\tIf we could set forth all of God’s attributes and tell all that He is, we would fall on our knees in adoring worship.\tThe Bible tells us that God dwells in light that is unapproachable, whom no man can see or has seen, and whom no man can see and live.\tIt says that God is holy and eternal and omnipotent and omniscient and sovereign, and that He has a thousand sovereign attributes. And all of these should humble us and bring us down!\tI have come to believe that no worship is wholly pleasing to God until there is nothing in us displeasing to God. If there is anything within me that does not worship God, then there is nothing in me that worships God perfectly.\tNote that I am not saying that God must have a perfection of worship or He will not accept any worship at all. I would not go so far; if I did, I would rule myself out. But, I do say that the ideal God sets before us is to worship as near to perfectly as we can. Faith and love and obedience and loyalty and high conduct of life—all of these must be taken as burnt offerings and offered to God!\tTrue worship seeks union with its beloved, and an active effort to close the gap between the heart and the God it adores is worship at its best!

“I have come to believe that no worship is wholly pleasing to God until there is nothing in us displeasing to God. If there is anything within me that does not worship God, then there is nothing in me that worships God perfectly.Note that I am not saying that God must have a perfection of worship or He will not accept any worship at all. I would not go so far; if I did, I would rule myself out. But, I do say that the ideal God sets before us is to worship as near to perfectly as we can. Faith and love and obedience and loyalty and high conduct of life—all of these must be taken as burnt offerings and offered to God!” - A thorough summary of what growth unto Priestliness contains.

January 9Believe the Right Thing about the Right PersonNow the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost. Romans 15:13THERE IS A NEBULOUS IDEA ACCEPTED by many in our day that faith is an almighty power flowing through the universe which anyone may plug into at will! It is conceived vaguely as a subrational creative pulsation streaming down from somewhere Up There, ready at any time to enter our hearts and change our whole mental and moral constitution as well as our total outlook on man, God, and the cosmos.\tWhen it comes in, supposedly out go pessimism, fear, defeat and failure; in come optimism, confidence, personal mastery and unfailing success in war, love, sports, business and politics.\tAll of this is, of course, a gossamer of self-deception woven of the unsubstantial threads of fancy spun out of minds of tenderhearted persons who want to believe it! What is overlooked in all this is that faith is good only when it engages truth; when it is made to rest upon falsehood it can and often does lead to eternal tragedy.\tFor it is not enough that we believe; we must believe in the right thing about the right One!\tTo believe in God is more than to believe that He exists. To a right faith knowledge is necessary. We must know at least something of what God is like and what His will is for His human creatures. To know less than this is to be thrown back upon the necessity of accepting the affirmations of the soul and substituting “Thus saith my soul” for the biblical “Thus saith the Lord,” and no man has any right to pick and choose among revealed truths.

January 10Every One Must Pray as if He Alone Could PrayAnd he spoke a parable unto them to this end, that men ought always to pray, and not to faint. Luke 18:1THOMAS Á KEMPIS WROTE that the man of God ought to be more at home in his prayer chamber than before the public. It is not too much to say that the preacher who loves to be before the public is hardly prepared spiritually to be before them. Right praying may easily make a man hesitant to appear before an audience.\tThe man who is really at home in the presence of God will find himself caught in a kind of inward contradiction. He is likely to feel his responsibility so keenly that he would rather do almost anything than face an audience; and yet the pressure upon his spirit may be so great that wild horses could not drag him away from his pulpit.\tNo man should stand before an audience who has not first stood before God. Many hours of communion should precede one hour in the pulpit. The prayer chamber should be more familiar than the public platform.\tSchools teach everything about preaching except the important part, praying. The best any school can do is to recommend prayer and exhort to its practice. Praying itself must be the work of the individual. That it is the one religious work which gets done with the least enthusiasm cannot but be one of the tragedies of our times!\tIn true prayer, every man must be an original, for true prayer cannot be imitated nor can it be learned from someone else. Everyone must pray as if he alone could pray!

January 11A Calamity: Accepting This World as Our HomeLove not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. 1 John 2:15OF ALL THE CALAMITIES THAT HAVE BEEN VISITED upon the world, the surrender of the human spirit to this present world and its ways is the worst—without doubt!\tNo oriental monarch ever ruled his cowering subjects with any more cruel tyranny than things—visible things, audible things, tangible things—rule mankind.\tThat we who were made to communicate with angels and archangels and seraphim and with the God who made them all—that we should settle down here as a wild eagle of the air come down to scratch in the barnyard with the common hens—this I say is the worst of anything that has ever come to the world!\tIt seems incredible that we who were made for many worlds should accept this one world as our ultimate home.\tMan was made in the image of God and is now a fallen being that has left its place in the celestial world and has plummeted down like a falling star. Now, in this world, he has all but forgotten the place from which he came.\tThat is why the devil sees to it that we seldom get alone with time to think and meditate on the reality of the other world. For when a man really gets alone, he senses often that this life in this world is not the answer—it is not the end.\tActually and simply, a Christian is one who dedicates himself to God to inhabit another and better world!

January 12Satan Would Bind Us in Our Own Grave ClothesFor this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil. 1 John 3:8IT IS PART OF THE DEVIL’S BUSINESS to keep the Christian’s spirit imprisoned. He knows that the believing and justified Christian has been raised up out of the grave of his sins and trespasses. From that point on, Satan works that much harder to keep us bound and gagged, actually imprisoned in our own grave clothes!\tHe knows that if we continue in this kind of bondage we will never be able to claim our rightful spiritual heritage. He knows also that while we continue bound in this kind of enslavement we are not much better off than when we were spiritually dead.\tThis is one reason why the Christians in today’s churches are behaving like a flock of frightened sheep—so intimidated by the devil that we can’t even say “Amen!”\tI am sure that it is not glorifying to our God that Christians should be so intimidated and silenced in our day. It was Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory, who came down and took our human body for Himself. He was a man, born of a woman, a man wearing our own nature—but He was also God!\tHe went out to the cross and they sacrificed Him there. The Father, God Almighty, accepted His sacrifice as the one, final fulfillment and consummation of all the sacrifices ever made on Jewish altars. After three days, He came out of the grave, then ascended as Victor over death and hell!\tBelieving this, we ought to be the most fearless, the happiest and most God-assured people in the whole world!

January 13Learn to Love God for Himself AloneWe love him, because he first loved us. 1 John 4:19THE PHRASE, “THE LOVE OF GOD,” when used by Christians almost always refers to God’s love for us. We must remember that it can also mean our love for God!\tThe first and great commandment is that we should love God with all the power of our total personality. Though all love originates in God and is for that reason God’s own love, yet we are permitted to catch and reflect back that love in such manner that it becomes our love indeed!\tThe Christian’s love for God has by some religious thinkers been divided into two kinds, the love of gratitude and the love of excellence. But we must carry our love to God further than love of gratitude and love of excellence.\tThere is a place in the religious experience where we love God for Himself alone, with never a thought of His benefits. There is, in the higher type of love, a suprarational element that cannot and does not attempt to give reasons for its existence—it only whispers, “I love!”\tIn the perfection of love, the heart does not reason from admiration to affection, but quickly rises to the height of blind adoration where reason is suspended and the heart worships in unreasoning blessedness. It can only exclaim, “Holy, holy, holy,” while scarcely knowing what it means.\tIf this should all seem too mystical, too unreal, we offer no proof. But some will read and recognize the description of the sunlit peaks where they have been for at least brief periods and to which they long often to return. And such will need no proof!

January 14Feeling Right: Not the Same as Being RightThe lord of that servant shall come and appoint him his portion with the hypocrites. Matthew 24:50, 51IT APPEARS THAT TOO MANY CHRISTIANS want to enjoy the thrill of feeling right but are not willing to endure the inconvenience of being right!\tThe glaring disparity between theology and practice among professing Christians is a more destructive evil in its effect upon the Christian religion than communism, Romanism and liberalism combined.\tSo wide is the gulf that separates theory from practice in the church that an inquiring stranger who chances upon both would scarcely dream that there was any relation between them.\tAn intelligent observer of our human scene who heard the Sunday morning sermon and later watched the Sunday afternoon conduct of those who had heard it would conclude that he had been examining two distinct and contrary religions!\tChristians habitually weep and pray over beautiful truth, only to draw back from that same truth when it comes to the difficult job of putting it in practice.\tThe average church simply does not dare to check its practices against biblical precepts. It tolerates things that are diametrically opposed to the will of God. This can be explained only by assuming a lack of integration in the religious personality. The mind can approve and the emotions enjoy while the will drags its feet and refuses to go along!\tAnd since Christ makes His appeal directly to the will, are we not justified in wondering whether or not these divided souls have ever made a true commitment to the Lord?