Pure Words

By Warren Wiersbe

Read Psalm 12:1-8 

When you feel deserted, alone in standing for what's right, read Psalm 12. The emphasis in this psalm is on words, on speaking. First, David speaks in prayer (vv. 1-3). Where are the godly? People today don't want to take a stand for the truth, but David stood for what is right.

Sometimes we feel the faithful have disappeared--those who believe in prayer, giving and commitment. Today's generation doesn't believe in commitment, especially with our words. We hear so much empty talk, lies and flattery. Flattery is manipulative, not communicative, like our advertising and some of our preaching.

Second, the wicked speak in pride (v. 4). Never underestimate the power of speech. Jesus told the truth; His enemies argued. He gave words of life; they rejected Him. He came in love; they crucified Him. One of the evidences that a person is giving the truth of God's Word is that he is rejected. People don't want to hear truth unless they belong to truth (John 10:4).

Third, God speaks in promise (vv. 5,7). His words are pure, not empty lying (v. 6). But the words of the wicked will burn in the furnace. God's Word is precious, because it cost Jesus' life. It is proved (v. 6) and permanent (v. 7). He keeps His promises. God knows where His people are, and He helps them. "I will arise"; "I will protect"; "I can be trusted" (vv. 5-7).

So much that is spoken in this world is untrue and empty talk. Be encouraged that God speaks in promise. His Word is pure and true. When you are surrounded by lies, rest on the promises of the Bible.

Humble yourselves therefore

By A.B. Simpson


The pressure of hard places makes us value life. Every time we come through such a trial, it is like a new beginning, and we learn better how much life is worth and make more of it for God and man. The pressure helps us to understand the trials of others and fits us to help and sympathize with them. 

There is a shallow, superficial nature that gets hold of a theory or a promise and talks very glibly about the distrust of those who shrink from every trial. But the man or woman who has suffered much never does this. Knowing what suffering really means, he or she is very tender and gentle. This is what Paul meant when he said, Death worketh in us, but life in you (2 Corinthians 4:12). Trials and hard places are needed to press us forward, even as the furnace fires in the hold of the mighty steamship give the force that moves the Piston, drives the engine and propels that great vessel in the face of winds and waves.

Desperate Days

By Mrs. Charles E. Cowman


"But without faith it is impossible to please him: for he that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him." (Heb. 11:6).

The faith for desperate days.

The Bible is full of such days. Its record is made up of them, its songs are inspired by them, its prophecy is concerned with them, and its revelation has come through them.

The desperate days are the stepping-stones in the path of light. They seem to have been God's opportunity and man's school of wisdom.

There is a story of an Old Testament love feast in Psalm 107, and in every story of deliverance the point of desperation gave God His chance. The "wit's end" of desperation was the beginning of God's power. Recall the promise of seed as the stars of heaven, and as the sands of the sea, to a couple as good as dead. Read again the story of the Red Sea and its deliverance, and of Jordan with its ark standing mid-stream. Study once more the prayers of Asa, Jehoshaphat, and Hezekiah, when they were sore pressed and knew not what to do. Go over the history of Nehemiah, Daniel, Hosea, and Habakkuk. Stand with awe in the darkness of Gethsemane, and linger by the grave in Joseph's garden through those terrible days. Call the witnesses of the early Church, and ask the apostles the story of their desperate days.

Desperation is better than despair.

Faith did not make our desperate days. Its work is to sustain and solve them. The only alternative to a desperate faith is despair, and faith holds on and prevails.

There is no more heroic example of desperate faith than that of the three Hebrew children. The situation was desperate, but they answered bravely, "Our God whom we serve is able to deliver us from the burning, fiery furnace; and he will deliver us out of thine hand, O king. But if not, be it known unto thee, O king, that we will not serve thy gods, nor worship the golden image which thou hast set up." I like that, "but if not !"

I have only space to mention Gethsemane. Ponder deeply its "Nevertheless." "If it is possible...nevertheless!" Deep darkness had settled upon the soul of our Lord. Trust meant anguish unto blood and darkness to the descent of hell--Nevertheless! Nevertheless!!

Now get your hymn book and sing your favorite hymn of desperate faith. --Rev. S. Chadwick

"When obstacles and trials seem
Like prison walls to be,
I do the little I can do
And leave the rest to Thee.

"And when there seems no chance, no change,
From grief can set me free,
Hope finds its strength in helplessness,
And calmly waits for Thee."

And they did all eat, and were filled. and they took up of the fragments that remained twelve baskets full--Mat 14:20

George H. Morrison - Devotional Sermons 

     
 The Lavishness of Jesus
     
      And they did all eat, and were filled. and they took up of the fragments that remained twelve baskets full--Mat 14:20
     
      Love Never Asks How Little Can I Do
     
      One of the characteristics of our Lord was a certain glorious lavishness, an uncalculating generosity that was impatient of the less or more. This made Him very lovable. It was one of the features of His grace. He exhibited that royal largeness which always captivates the human heart. For the miser is universally condemned, and the stingy person forever unattractive, nor does the niggard, though scrupulously just, ever really draw the hearts of men. There is a lavishness which is pure thoughtlessness, and which sooner or later issues in remorse. It is far easier for shallow natures to squander than to save. But the lavishness of Jesus struck its roots into His deepest being, and was the flower of uncalculating love. Love never asks how little can I do; love always asks how much. Love does not merely go the measured mile; love travels to the uttermost. Love never haggles, never bargains, with "nicely calculated less or more." It gives up to the point of prodigality.
     
      The Lavishness of Jesus in His Actions
     
      We find the lavishness of Christ in every sphere, and first let us note it in His actions. "Gather up the fragments that remain, and they gathered up twelve baskets full." Men find in that a lesson in economy. Christ was careful that not a crumb be lost. And it is well we should be taught that lesson--we are so apt to be careless with life's fragments. But surely a far deeper lesson, leading us to the inmost heart of Jesus, is that of His uncalculating lavishness. He took no nice and precise measurements of what that hungry multitude required. He did not think of the minimum of need; He thought of the maximum of love. He gave so lavishly that when every man was fed, and every little whimpering child was satisfied, there yet remained twelve baskets full. That was the manner in which Jesus gave, and in such a manner is He giving still. Men come for healing, and they get pardon also. They come for a shilling and they get a sovereign. I take it that is why so many people fail to see the answers to their prayers; they have asked for a sixpence, and they get a fortune.
     
      The Lavishness of Jesus in His Parabolic Teaching
     
      The same uncalculating lavishness of love is witnessed in the teaching of His parables. I do not think there is a single parable in which that divine element is wanting. The sower does not nicely measure things; he sows on the beaten path and on the rock. The employer of labour, at the eleventh hour, gives a full day's pay for an hour's work. The servant who was faithful with ten pounds finds himself the ruler of ten cities, no doubt to his own intense astonishment. Men quarrel with the doctrine of rewards. They say we ought to do good for its own sake. Christ, knowing human nature, never hesitates to introduce rewards. But then His rewards are so amazing, so utterly unproportioned to our merit, that they entirely lose the aspect of reward, and shine as gifts of undeserved grace. When the poor prodigal came home again, a bare forgiveness would have contented him. But it evidently did not content the overflowing heart of Jesus. The best robe must be given to him; there must be a ring on his finger and shoes upon his feet; there must be music and dancing in the house.
     
      Jesus Noticed the Much Found in the Little
     
      Again, we might think a moment of the kind of thing that Jesus loved. If we are to follow Him, and take His scale of values, it is imperative that we discover that. He did not love the narrowness of Pharisees, nor had He any tenderness for lengthy prayers. He felt no sympathy with the precise exactitude that tithes the mint and the anise and the cummin. But one day He saw a widow woman lavishing her little all for God, and that caught the tendrils of His heart. Again, another day there came a woman with an alabaster box of precious ointment. And she broke the box and poured that precious ointment on the dear feet of Him whom she loved. And men were indignant at this gross extravagance--to what purpose is this waste?--but to Jesus it was incomparably fine. It was not the squandering of hysteria. To Him it was the lavishness of love. It was love, despising calculation, and giving to the very uttermost. He caught in it a spark of that same flame that had lit up every moment of His life, and was now to shine in glory on the cross.
     
      Was Christ's Death for All a Waste Since All Do Not Accept Him?
     
      Jesus died on the cross for every man. He died for the sins of the whole world. There was virtue in that atoning death for all the guilty sinners of mankind. Now look around and tell me, are all men being saved? Are none going down into the glen of weeping? Are none heading for the outer darkness? If so, to what purpose is this waste? Why this lavish squandering of sacrifice in the agony and dereliction of the cross? The only answer is that God is love, and love never asks how little, but how much. Love does not calculate nor nicely measure; it gives as the woman with the alabaster box did. In that lavishness our Saviour lived. In that lavishness He fed the multitude. In that lavishness He died on Calvary.

Needless Regrets!

Things That Matter Most: Chapter 28 - Needless Regrets!

By John Henry Jowett


"IF Thou hadst been here my brother had not died." That is a Scriptural example of a very familiar experience. It illustrates a most commonplace form of grief. It is an example of needless regrets. "If Thou hadst been here my brother had not died." If we had arranged things a little differently, how different might have been the issues! If we had taken another turning, what a contrast in our destiny! If only we had done so-and-so, Lazarus might have been with us still! 

My readers will recognize the familiarity of the utterance. It is the expression of a common human infirmity. Its sound travels through the years like the haunting sigh of a low moan. "If only . . . !" "If only . . . !" And the pathetic cry is with us to-day. It is usually born on the morning after a crisis, and it sometimes continues until the plaintive soul itself goes home to rest. It is a sorrow that consumes like a gangrene. It drains away the vital strength. If by some gracious ministry it could be ended, and the moan changed into trustful quietude, an enormous load would be lifted from the heart of the race.

 Men and women are being crushed under needless regrets. And here is one of them: "Lord, if Thou hadst been here my brother had not died!" It was a regret that shut out the kindly light of the stars which God has ordained should shine and cheer us in our nights. I wish, therefore, to look at the incident with the utmost simplicity, in the prayerful hope that similar burdens may be lifted from the hearts of some who may read these words.

It was a beautiful friendship which united the Lord with the family at Bethany. Their home was very evidently one of His favourite resorts. He turned to it for its friendly peace. Perhaps He found in this little circle a love that was not tainted with interested ambition. Perhaps He found a friendship that sought no gift and coveted no place. Perhaps He found a full-orbed sympathy, unbroken by suspicion or reserve. Perhaps He found a confidence which was independent of the multitude, and which remained quietly steadfast whether He moved in public favour or in public contempt. At any rate, Jesus was at home "in the house of Martha and Mary," and here all unnecessary reticence was changed into free and sunny communion. He loved to turn from the heated, feverish atmosphere of fickle crowds to the cool and restful constancy of these devoted friends. 

When the eyes of His enemies had been following Him with malicious purpose, it was spiritually recreating to look into eyes that were just quiet "homes of silent prayer." After the contentions of the Twelve, and their constant disputes as to who should be greatest, it was good to be in this retired home where friends found love's reward in love's sacrifices, and the joy of loving in the increased capacity to love. It is therefore no wonder to read, as we do so frequently, that "Jesus went out to Bethany."

And now a darker record begins. "A certain man was sick, Lazarus of Bethany, of the village of Mary and her sister Martha." We know. nothing about Lazarus, except that Jesus loved him. Not a single lineament of his character has been offered to our imagination. And yet, somehow, I feel as though I know him well. He was one of those glorious men about whom our modern Press could scarcely compose a single readable paragraph. He was a gracious, lovable nobody. He was a "home-bird." He was a lover of the fireside. He was a beautiful commonplace. He did nothing except live a noble life. He was one of the nobodies whose presence constitutes the very sanctity of home. And he was sick.

What will the sisters do? They know of the Saviour's mysterious power over sicknesses. They had heard of it; they had probably seen it. Should they send for Him? Lazarus would not hear of it! These good souls never will. Said Lazarus: "He has got something better to do than trouble about me. Trouble not the Master. Let Him go on telling His good news unto men." And the sisters heeded their brother. But he grew gradually weaker, and they took counsel together, perhaps unknown to their forbearing patient. And then a sort of compromise was born which paid respect to their brother's wish while giving expression to their own. "We won't exactly ask Him to come! We will just send Him the news and leave the decision to Him." "The sisters therefore sent unto Him saying, Lord, behold, he whom Thou lovest is sick."

What will the Master do? Surely He will haste with all speed to the stricken home! He will take comfort where He has so often received it. He will lift the burden where the burden has been so often lifted from Him. "When therefore Jesus heard that he was sick He abode at that time two days in the place where He was." It was one of those mysterious delays which so often burden our life. There were the sisters in Bethany, waiting, wondering, saddening. Will He never come? Has He forgotten? "Then after this He saith to the disciples, Let us go into Judaea again." And so He came to Bethany, but it was too late. Lazarus was dead.

"If Thou hadst been here! If only we had sent two days earlier! If only we had done it without consulting our brother! If--if--if only!" 

This is, I say, a type of needless regret. It was a retrospect which darkened sorrow. It added a deeper gloom to the night. And it was all so gratuitous, so needless, so unwise. Why should they now go back, and fetch remorse from yesterday, and load their heart to the point of bursting?

And the same remorseful "if" rankles in human life to-day. How often I have heard it when loved ones have been taken away. Poor laden hearts have added to their burden by their sharp regrets. "If we had only gone south instead of north." "If I had taken the first illness more seriously." "If I had only got her away when she began to grow tired." "If I had only given up that engagement." "If I had never gone away." "If we had called in the doctor earlier." And so the poor, weeping souls moan on as if our God was dead.

And how often I have heard the wail when some choice or enterprise has apparently failed. "If we had only put him into a trade instead of a profession!" "If only we had put him in a profession instead of a trade!" "If only we had never sent him away from home!" "If only we had taken the other alternative!" "If only we had listened to this man's counsel instead of that man's counsel!" "If only! If only!" Or perhaps there is some decision concerning ourselves about which we have now become uncertain when it is too late to make a change. We thought about it, we took counsel about it, we prayed about it. Then we acted, and now we think we see. "If only I had waited another week!" "If only I had taken the first post that offered!" "If only I had been contented with good instead of fondly looking for better!" And so there comes a seeming "after-wisdom." We assume that we are "wise after the event." Our lamp is now burning, but it has been kindled too late, and its only use is to reveal to us our tragic and irremediable mistakes.

Now in the case of Martha and Mary the remorseful regret was altogether needless. "If Thou hadst been here!" But He had been there all the time. He had been with them in deepest sympathy, in kindly thought, in gracious intention, in tender and yet ample plan. What they were thinking to be a lamentable mischance was a vital part of a larger scheme, begotten and inspired by unfailing love. They had scarcely, if ever, been out of His mind since He heard the news. There was no need for regret; everything was just . exactly right.

And so it is with most of the "ifs," the remorseful "ifs" that ravage and devastate our peace. If there be a personal devil, who makes it his work to sow seeds of unhappiness and discord and unrest, multitudes of these "ifs" must be of his unholy planting. And for this reason. They destroy filial trust; they destroy spiritual peace; they destroy the wide sweeping light of Christian hope. The devil sows these needless regrets, and the thorns choke the good seed, and our spiritual harvest is starved or destroyed.

And even supposing we have made mistakes, and we would dearly like to have the choice back again that we might take the other turning, what then? Who is our God? And what are His name and character? Cannot He knit up the ravelled bit of work, and in His own infinitely gracious way make it whole again? With all our mistakes we may throw ourselves upon His inexhaustible goodness, and say with St. Theresa, "Undertake Thou for me, O Lord."

It is the very gospel of His grace that He can repair the things that are broken. He can reset the joints of the bruised reed. He can restore the broken heart. He can deal with the broken vow. And if He can do all this, can He not deal with our mistakes? If unknowingly we went astray, and took the wrong turning, will not His infinite love correct our mistakes, and make the crooked straight?

10 Year Old Bible Preacher Preaches On Evangelism / Soulwinning/ Love Warns!

(10 year old) Joshua Adam Hartinger was asked to preach a message (This was entitled "Love Warns" regarding Evangelism) by a good friend and Brother in the Lord, Bryan Ratliff (Pastor at Clearbrook Baptist) on July 1, 2012.

Street Evangelism/SubMission Hemet-Palm Springs

After God's Silence - What?

By Oswald Chambers


'When He had heard therefore that he was sick, He abode two days in the same place where he was.'
John 11:6

Has God trusted you with a silence - a silence that is big with meaning? God's silences are His answers. Think of those days of absolute silence in the home at Bethany! Is there anything analogous to those days in your life? Can God trust you like that, or are you still asking for a visible answer? God will give you the blessings you ask if you will not go any further without them; but His silence is the sign that He is bringing you into a marvellous understanding of Himself. Are you mourning before God because you have not had an audible response? You will find that God has trusted you in the most intimate way possible, with an absolute silence, not of despair, but of pleasure, because He saw that you could stand a bigger revelation. If God has given you a silence, praise Him, He is bringing you into the great run of His purposes. The manifestation of the answer in time is a matter of God's sovereignty. Time is nothing to God. For a while you said - "I asked God to give me bread, and He gave me a stone." He did not, and to-day you find He gave you the bread of life.

A wonderful thing about God's silence is that the contagion of His stillness gets into you and you become perfectly confident - "I know God has heard me." His silence is the proof that He has. As long as you have the idea that God will bless you in answer to prayer, He will do it, but He will never give you the grace of silence. If Jesus Christ is bringing you into the understanding that prayer is for the glorifying of His Father, He will give you the first sign of His intimacy - silence.

WHAT’S RIGHT ABOUT MEGACHURCHES

Phil Cooke. Com

EXCERPT

Megachurches.

Hard to believe but I sometimes think we Christians spend more time criticizing large churches than anything else. Are there problems in 2,000+ member churches? Of course. But I work with churches of all sizes for a living, and I can tell you that for every case of shallow teaching, bad theology, leadership failures, financial improprieties, or whatever the criticism du jour happens to be, I can point to a long list of 50+ member churches guilty of the same things.

 READ HERE

LEADERS: WHAT TO DO WHEN A CRISIS HAPPENS

EXCERPT

PC: What special dangers do we face from the Internet when it comes to moral failings in the workplace?

READ HERE 

"That take and give for Me and thee" (Matt. xvii. 27).

Days of Heaven Upon Earth

      "That take and give for Me and thee" (Matt. xvii. 27).
    
      There is a beautiful touch of loving thoughtfulness in the account of Christ's miracle at Capernaum in providing the tribute money. After the reference to Peter's interview with the tax collector, it is added, "When he came into the house Jesus prevented him," that is, anticipated him, as the old Saxon word means, by arranging for the need before Peter needed to speak about it at all, and He sent Peter down to the sea to find the piece of gold in the mouth of the fish.
    
      So our dear Lord is always thinking in advance of our needs, and He loves to save us from embarrassment, and anticipate our anxieties and cares by laying up His loving acts and providing before the emergency comes. Then with exquisite tenderness the Master adds: "That take and give for Me and thee." He puts Himself first in the embarrassing need and bears the heavy end of the burden for His distressed and suffering child. He makes our cares His cares, our sorrows His sorrows, our shame His shame, and "He is able to be touched with the feeling of our infirmities."

And Abraham drew near. Genesis 18:23

Our Daily Homily  




And Abraham drew near. Genesis 18:23

The patriarch's attitudes are well worthy of note: he sat (Genesis 18:1), bowed (Genesis 18:2), ran (Genesis 18:7), stood by (Genesis 18:8), went with them (Genesis 18:16), stood before the Lord (Genesis 18:22); here, he drew near.

He drew near with awful reverence. - " I have taken upon me to speak unto the Lord, which am but dust and ashes." The place whereon he stood was holy ground; and if he trod or crossed it, in the intensity of his desire, he never forgot that the most intimate fellowship of man with God must be mingled with the reverence of godly fear, which remembers that He is a consuming fire.

He drew near in faith. - He had enjoyed a blessed prevision of the day of Christ. There had been revealed to Him that one perfect and sufficient Sacrifice, in virtue of which sinners are welcome to draw near to God. They have boldness to enter the holiest, and draw near with a true heart in full assurance of faith, who know the new and living way which Jesus has opened for us.

He drew near as intercessor. - We never get so near God as when we plead for others. At such times we enter the holiest and innermost chamber, and talk to Him with an urgency which we dare not use for ourselves. Whilst the Syrophenician pleaded for her daughter, she came to the very feet of Jesus. Wouldst thou know the inner chamber? Go thither on errands for others.

He drew near in Intensity. - When Haman pleaded for his life, he fell on the Queen's couch in the anguish of his soul. Sometimes God appears to hesitate; it is only to draw us on, ever further and deeper, till we awake to find ourselves alone in His presence.

Tribulation, Kingdom, and Patience

By G. Campbell Morgan

... the tribulation and kingdom and patience... in Jesus.... Revelation 1:9


The text is only a phrase. But what a phrase it is. Taken thus, in separation from its context it is full of suggestiveness. Its opening word, "tribulation," is tremulous with sadness. It speaks of stress and strain and sorrow. Its central word, "kingdom," is pregnant with majesty. It speaks of government and order and strength. Its final word, "patience," is vibrant with heroism. It speaks of courage, and fidelity, and endurance. Final word, did I say? I was wrong. There is yet another, and it is supreme. "In Jesus" are the final words, and they qualify, interpret, glorify, all that have gone before. "... the tribulation and kingdom and patience... in Jesus...."

All this becomes far more arresting and illuminative when the phrase is considered in relation to its context. Therein it is the description of an experience; the experience of the writer; the experience of those to whom, or for whom he was writing; and--as the phrase itself reveals--the experience supremely of Jesus Himself.

The writer thus describes himself and his situation:

I John, your brother and partaker with you... was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God and the testimony of Jesus. I was in the Spirit on the Lord's Day,...

His writing was addressed to "... the seven churchs which are in Asia...." To Ephesus in danger of false teachers and bearing persecutions; to Smyrna, in tribulation, poor, suffering, some of them imprisoned; to Pergamum, dwelling where Satan had his throne and where Antipas was martyred; to Thyatira, in danger from the false prophetess and patiently enduring; to Sardis, overwhelmed in death, only a few remaining undefiled; to Philadelphia, keeping the word, not denying the name, under the most difficult circumstances; to Laodicea, made tepid by prosperity, that gravest of all perils that ever threatens the holy church.

Moreover, his writing was by the direct command of the One Who, speaking of His own experience said, "... I was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore,..."

Our phrase then describes the experience of John, of the church, and of Jesus. It presents two outlooks which qualify each other. The first is the outlook on circumstances, and the whole of that outlook is condensed, compressed, packed into one throbbing word, tribulation. The other is the outlook on life, and the whole of that outlook is expressed in the two words, the kingdom, and the patience.

Let us then consider first this twofold Christian experience; the experience of circumstances and the experience of life. Let us then attempt to consider the mutual relation of these two phases of the Christian experience which cannot be separated in this present time and age and dispensation.

First, then, the twofold experience itself. The first phase is that of the experience of circumstances, expressed in one word, tribulation. What is tribulation? The thought of the word is that of pressure producing actual suffering. I can do no better than illustrate its meaning by reference to our Lord's use of it, when in the Upper Room He was discoursing with His own, prior to His departure. In the course of that conversation He said: "In the world ye have tribulation:..." In the same discourse a few sentences earlier, our Lord employed a most arrestingly suggestive figure which helps us to understand what tribulation is;

A woman when she is in travail hath sorrow, because her hour is come: but when she is delivered of the child, she remembereth no more the anguish, for the joy that a man is born into the world.

The word there rendered anguish is the same word. We are brought by that flash of intimate understanding and tender grace, to an interpretation of tribulation; it is the pressure that means agony, but it is the travail that issues in life and joy. That is the experience of the church, of John as it was of Jesus, in this world.

Mark the persistence of it, taking first of all that which must be supreme in our thinking, the experience of our Lord Himself. His whole life was a life of tribulation; to quote the prophetic word uttered concerning the Messiah long ere He came, He was "... a man of sorrows and acquainted with grief:..." As we observe Him from babyhood to boyhood, and from boyhood to manhood, and through full maturity to the completion of His public ministry, in ever-increasing measure we see Him always feeling the pressure of circumstances.

This was so in material things. He was homeless. "... foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests; but the Son of Man hath not where to lay His head." Mentally it was so. He had no comrades. He had no peers in the realm of thought. There were no great philosophers in His age; philosophy had become decadent before He came into the world. The great philosophers under the influence of whose teaching men were professing to live and act; Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, were not comrades for Him in their thinking. He was alone. Among the men of His own age and of His religion after the flesh, there was none able to enter into His conception of things or to soar to the height of His outlook.

Spiritually, He found no sympathy in the world at all. His spiritual concepts were not accepted by men, not understood of men. He stood alone. Such was His loneliness; materially without home, mentally without comrades, spiritually without sympathy. Life to Him was the bearing of a testimony to the essential and eternal things; the bearing of a testimony that men never apprehended, would not apprehend or receive. From the beginning to the end there crushed and pressed upon Him the false concepts and false ideals of men, which at last found their supreme expression in the words so often quoted and yet so terribly revealing: "... we will not have this man to reign over us." This pressure upon Him of circumstances found its culminating expression and experience in the Cross of Calvary.

The persistence of this experience of tribulation in the history of His people has been equally definite. The story of loyal-hearted discipleship has ever been, and still is, that if a man will live godly in this world he shall suffer persecution. The church forever contradicts the world. That is its business. That is what it is in the world for; to contradict it in its fundamental conceptions, in the conduct that grows out of its fundamental conceptions, and in the character which results from the persistent conception expressing itself in conduct. The church in the world is an eternal negative to the things which are supremely of the world.

With what result? The world is forever opposed to the church. It is against the church. It will bring all its pressure to bear upon the church. It will do everything to silence her voice and destroy her influence and end her propaganda. If this is not so, it is because the church has forgotten her message. If the world now is making friends with the church, then alas for the church. The world has not changed. Its central conception of life, its ideal, is still that of the magnificence of mastery and the glory of the material. The church's ideal is still that of the magnificence of service and sacrifice and the beauty of the spiritual. These things cannot merge and mix without the quality being changed entirely on the one side or the other. 

The church is in the world to affirm the things of the beginning, the original things of truth, the meaning and the reason of things; to tell man what man has honestly sought to discover for himself but never has been able, the reason, the truth behind everything. The world is still saying: "We will not have these things"; the world is still against the church. The church stands in the center of this pressure, bearing her witness and feeling the agony of her loneliness and her strife with the things against which she is called to protest. This is a persistent experience.

But this is not all the truth about the experience of the church's Lord and of the church. We need the other two words of my text; not only is it an experience of tribulation, it is also an experience of the kingdom and the patience. Two thoughts are suggested by these words, and yet they are so closely related that they describe one supreme fact. In the one case, that of tribulation, we have the experience of circumstances. In the other, that of the kingdom and patience, we have the experience of the church in her very life, that which constitutes her what she is, that which differentiates her from all other societies, that which makes a distinction clear, sharp, between a man of God and a man of the world. 

What then do these words connote? The word "kingdom" connotes the rule and the realm of a king. Here, of course, the reference is to the Kingdom of God, and not to any dispensational interpretation of the phrase, not to any dispensational application or value, but to the fact of the Kingdom of God. It is the static, unchanged, abiding fact. It is static, that is, it is the one fact that has never altered, never changed, the fact that abides. The Kingship of God, the Divine sovereignty, holds all things in the grasp of its power and within the authority of its management. The whole fact of the universe is included, whether it be heaven above, or the earth beneath, or the depths of the underworld below. Nothing escapes from the operation of that one fact. Satan himself must report in the Divine Presence ere he goes upon any mission of persecuting the sons of God. The arch enemy of mankind cannot touch one single piece of your property, not so much as a hair upon the back of a camel that you possess, until he has asked permission. Satan desires to sift you. Then he must ask before he can do it. Satan desires to plunge a continent in war. Then he cannot act save under a Divine control. If in the Divine control there be a process of judgment, it is judgment proceeding toward the accomplishment of a purpose of mercy. The true experience of the whole church of God in its life is fundamentally an experience of that Kingdom of God.

And closely related, indeed growing out of it as an inevitable sequence, there is the experience of patience. The word literally means, "staying under"; but the staying under always means staying on. If we are to stay under the pressure of circumstances, we must stay on the kingship of God. Patience is the experience of the soul that relates itself to the Kingdom of God and relates all circumstances to that selfsame fact. The soul, keen and sensitive to the fact of the Divine Kingship, is able to remain under the pressure of circumstances, tribulation, affliction, persecution, as it relates them all to the underlying fact. In use the word always connotes cheerful, hopeful endurance. It is never used of that state of mind that says things are as they are and cannot be helped. That is not patience, that is stupidity. Patience will feel the agony, shudder at its appearance, and be conscious of its pain; but patience will hear the undertone of the eternal music and express it in song even when circumstances press and grind upon the soul.

In the experience of our Lord the persistence of this sense of the Kingdom and of patience is most clearly marked. The whole truth was expressed in His own words in this same discourse to which I have already referred. When He said: "... In the world ye have tribulation,..." He also said: "... but be of good cheer. I have overcome the world." The victory of His life was gained by submission to the static fact of the Divine Kingship and by consequent sovereignty over all circumstances.

He gave us the supreme exemplification of the experiences of life. His life was homed in the centrality of the Divine government and expressed itself in infinite patience and so mastered all tribulation.

And that was not only the experience of our Lord Himself. By His grace and through the ministry of His Spirit, it is the experience of the Christian church. If her experience is that of fellowship with His sufferings, it is also that of fellowship in His triumph. There was one man who knew perhaps more of these things than any other man who appears upon the pages of the New Testament. I refer to Paul. When he was writing his second letter to the Corinthian Christians, he spoke twice of his own experience in this regard.

We are pressed on every side...--and that is the same word, tribulation--"... yet not straitened; perplexed, yet not unto despair; pursued, yet not forsaken; smitten down, yet not destroyed; always bearing about in the body the dying of Jesus, that the life also of Jesus may be manifested in our body."

And again;

... in everything commending ourselves, as ministers of God, in much patience, in afflictions,--(that same word)--in necessities, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in watchings, in fastings;--(that is the experience of tribulation)--in pureness, in knowledge, in long-suffering, in kindness, in the Holy Ghost, in love unfeigned, in the word of truth, in the power of God; by the armour of righteousness on the right hand and on the left--(this is the experience of the Kingdom)--by glory and dishonour, by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold, we live; as chastened, and not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things--(this is the experience of patience).

The church always overcomes the world. In the case of every individual martyr, the victory is with the man slain and not with the men who slay him. In every hour of persecution it is the church that is victorious, not the oppressive power that persecutes. Following in the pathway of her Lord and Master, Who death by dying slew, the church bends to bonds and stripes, is battered and bruised to death, to rise again in life immortal, and to triumph. Tribulation! yea verily, but also the kingdom and the patience that are in Jesus.

The mutual relation of these phases of experience has already been seen in our consideration, yet it is so important, as it seems to me, that it demands separate statement. Let us think of tribulation then in its relation to life, and then of life in its relation to tribulation.

Tribulation is caused by life. The sense of the kingdom and the sense of the patience of the soul makes the world's opposition inevitable. It is impossible to have a man or a society utterly sensible of the Divine government, utterly faithful to the Divine government, living in a world like this, but that man, that society, becomes a center of opposition. Consequently, it is the kingdom and patience that create the tribulation. If we relax our conviction as to the kingship and our patient fidelity to all that kingship inevitably connotes, then the pressure weakens. We shall not feel it so much. If we abandon our attitude and our fidelity toward the kingship of God, the pressure of the world will cease altogether. We need not have persecution if we do not desire it. All we have to do is to abandon our loyalty to the Kingdom of God. The world will not persecute us then.

But not only is it true that tribulation is caused by life; it is also true that tribulation strengthens life. The very forces that are against us are making us stronger. This is the strange and wonderful experience of all Christian souls and of the Christian church. Deepening loyalty increases patience. Growing pressure increases the strength of the life which it strives to destroy until life becomes forever and finally victorious.

From Antioch in Pisidia Paul was driven out. At Iconium they put him outside the gates. At Lystra they stoned him, leaving him for dead. After a while the broken, bruised body revived and he went to Derbe. When he had been there a while he went back to Lystra, the place of the stones; back to Iconium where they drove him out; back to Antioch in Pisidia. He went back to teach the Christians something that it was important they should know, that "Through many tribulations we must enter into the Kingdom of God."

The very pressure of the stones had deepened and intensified the sense of the real and the spiritual. He went back to tell those people that by these things we enter the Kingdom of God in all its fullness. The old saying is indeed true, that "The blood of the martyrs is the seed of the church." The church hidden in the Roman catacombs overcame the gross and devilish materialism of Rome. The church seated and patronized by Constantine on the Seven Hills, became weak, paralyzed. It has ever been so. It has been by the pressure and agony of tribulation, that the forces of the church's life have been increased and renewed and made powerful. The church persecuted is the church powerful because then she is true to her life and realizes her strength.

Life is surrendered to by tribulation. The sense of agony and the sense of patience in the soul makes opposition contributory to the very life which it is persecuting. Here again I quote from Paul in his letter to the Philippians: "... the things which happened unto me have fallen out... unto the progress of the gospel," as the Revised Version has it.

The things that have happened unto me--the bonds, the imprisonments--have turned out for the beating forward of the gospel.

Life transmutes tribulation, and so (in effect) Paul writes: "Let us also rejoice in our tribulations. Tribulation worketh patience, patience worketh conviction, conviction worketh hope!" Wherever we find life in its strength, we find tribulation in its pressure, but if we watch the process we see life transmuting tribulation.

These are dark days for the church of God. Are they? Think again! What has provoked this world conflict? The opposition of the world to the church. Exchange that for other words if you like and say it is a conflict of ideals. That is but another way of saying that it is a conflict caused by the opposition of the world to the church. This is a testimony to the power of the church. The passion for the mastery of the earth by brute force is the hatred of the world for the ideals of Christ.

What is the issue to be? Let us ask another question. For the moment what is happening? The church is led into a wilderness in which she looks the world squarely in the face and shudders. That is great gain. Too long the church has been playing fast and loose with the world, and now God has permitted a situation when the church is once again compelled to look at the world and see what it really means. As she does it, if she is true to God, she shudders and is ashamed.

But she is not only brought into a wilderness in which she can look the world squarely in the face. The church is brought to the place where she looks God in the face anew. There will happen to the church that which happened to Jacob at Jabbok; she will be able to say, presently, after the night and the darkness have passed: "For I have seen God face to face, and my life is healed."

That thing is true individually. Here is a boy back from the war, marvelously preserved from anything more serious than a wound that has incapacitated him for a month or so. This is what he said: "I never really knew God till I was at the front." No, he was not a heathen and a publican. He belonged to the church. But he saw God there. That experience is being multiplied, and the vision will heal. There will come to us a new sense of the powers of our life, a new experience of the agony and of the patience.

Are we in tribulation? are we in Patmos? Let us also be in the Spirit on the Lord's day. So shall we know the kingdom, so shall we know the patience. It may be we shall hear behind us the voice of a trumpet, and being turned to look we also shall see the Son of Man, girt about the paps with a golden girdle, with feet that shine like brass burnished in the furnace, with eyes that flash as with a flame of fire, with hair white as the driven snow. The thing He will say to us amid the carnage and the darkness is this:

"... I was dead, and behold, I am alive for evermore...."

False and True Discipleship

Devotional Hours with the Bible, Volume 6: Chapter 10 - False and True Discipleship
By J.R. Miller

Matthew 7:13-29

"Enter through the narrow gate. For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to life, and only a few find it."

There are two gates--one narrow and one wide--and two ways corresponding thereto. The easy way is not the right way. This is true in a very wide sense. It is true in the life of a child. There is a broad way of indulgence and indolence--but we know where it leads. There is a way of patient obedience in duty--and the end of this is worthy life and noble character. It is true in young manhood and womanhood. There is a way of pleasure, of ease--which leads to unworthy character. There is a way of self-denial, of discipline, of hard work--and this leads to honor. Then there is a broad way of selfishness and sin--which never reaches heaven's gates. And there is a way of penitence, of devotion to Christ, of spending and being spent in His service--which end is a seat beside the King on His throne!

It is a reason for great thankfulness, that there is a gate into the spiritual and heavenly life--and into heaven at the end. The glorious things are not beyond our reach. They are high, on dazzling summits--but there is a path that leads to them. We must note, however, that the gate is narrow.

Some people say that it is very easy to be a Christian. But really, it is not easy. It was not easy for the Son of God to prepare the way for us. It was necessary for Him to come from heaven in condescending love, and give His own life in opening the way. Jesus said also that any who would reach the glory of His kingdom, must go by the same way of the cross by which He had gone. He said that the one who will save his life--that is, withhold it from self-denial and sacrifice, shall lose it; and that he alone who loses his life--that is, gives it out in devotion to God and to duty--shall really save it (see 16:24, 25). In one of His parables, too, Jesus speaks of salvation as a treasure hid in a field, and the man who learns of the treasure and its hiding-place has to sell all that he has in order to buy the field (see 13:44). In another parable the same truth is presented under the figure of a merchant seeking goodly pearls, who had to sell all his stock of pearls--that he might buy the one peerless pearl (13:45).

The truth of the difficulty of entrance into the kingdom, is put in another way in this Sermon on the Mount. There are two roads through this world and two gates into the eternal world. One of these roads is broad and easy, with a descending grade, leading to a wide gate. It requires no exertion, no struggle, and no sacrifice to go this way. The other road is narrow and difficult--and leads to a narrow gate. To go this way one has to leave the crowd and walk almost alone--leave the broad, plain, easy road--and go on a hard, rugged road that often gets difficult and steep, entering by a gate too small to admit any bundles of worldliness or self-righteousness, or any of the trappings of the old life. If we get to heaven, we must make up our minds that it can be only by this narrow way of self-denial. There is a gate--but it is narrow and hard to pass through.

Jesus forewarned His friends against false prophets who would come to them in sheep's clothing--but who inwardly would be ravening wolves! There is something fearful in the eagerness of Satan to destroy men's lives! He resorts to every possible device. He sends his agents and messengers in forms and garbs intended to deceive the simple-minded and unwary. He even steals the dress of God's own servants, in order to gain the confidence of believers and then destroy their faith and lead them away to death. There always are such false teachers and guides. They try to pass for sheep--but the sheep's covering is only worn outside, while inside is the heart of a hungry, blood-thirsty wolf!

Many young people in these times fall under the influence of people who have caught smatterings of skeptical talk which they drop in the form of sneers or mocking queries into the ears of their confiding listeners. They laugh at the simple old cradle beliefs which these young Christians hold, calling them "superstitions." Then they go on to cast doubt upon, or at least to start questions about, this or that teaching in the Bible, or to caricature some Christian doctrine and hold it up in such a light as to make it look absurd. Thus these "false prophets" poison the minds of earnest young believers, and often destroy their childhood faith and fill them with doubt and perplexity!

Jesus makes it very plain in His teaching, that not profession but obedience is the test of Christian life. "Not everyone that says unto Me, 'Lord, Lord' shall enter into the kingdom of heaven; but he who does the will of My Father." It is not enough to believe in Christ, intellectually, even to be altogether orthodox in one's creed. It is not enough to seem to honor Christ before men, praying to Him and ascribing power to Him. Jesus tells us that some at last who thus seem to be His friends, publicly confessing Him--shall fail to enter the heavenly kingdom!

Why are these confessors of Christ, kept out of the heavenly kingdom? What are the conditions of entrance into this kingdom? The answer is given very plainly. Those alone enter the kingdom, who do the will of the Father who is in heaven. No profession, therefore, is true which is not attested and verified by a life of obedience and holiness. "Simply to Your cross I cling" is not all of the gospel--it is only half of it. No one is really clinging to the cross--who is not at the same time faithfully following Christ and doing whatever He commands. To enter into the kingdom of heaven, is to have in one's heart the heavenly spirit. We must do God's will. We cannot have Christ for our Savior, until we have Him also as our Master. We pray, "May Your will be done by me on earth, as it is done in heaven." If the prayer is sincere, it must draw our whole life with it in loving obedience and acquiescence to the Divine will.

The illustration at the close of the Sermon on the Mount, makes the teaching very plain. "Therefore whoever hears these sayings of mine, and does them, I will liken him unto a wise man, who built his house upon a rock." Everything turns on the doing or not doing of God's Word. Both the men here described hear the words--but only one of them obeys, and thus builds on the impregnable foundation. These two houses probably looked very much alike when they were finished. Indeed, the house on the sand may have been more attractive and more showy--than the house built farther up on the hillside. The difference, however, lay in the foundations.

There were two kinds of ground. There was a wide valley, which was dry and pleasant in the summer days, when these men were looking for building sites. Then way above this valley--were high, rocky bluffs. One man decided to build in the valley. It would cost much less. It was easy digging, and the excavations would be less expensive, for the ground was soft. Then it was more convenient also, for the bluffs were not easy of access. The other man looked farther ahead, however, and decided to build on the high ground. It would cost a great deal more--but it would be safer in the end.

So the two homes went up simultaneously, only the one in the valley was finished long before the other was, because it required much less labor. At last the two families moved into their respective residences, and both seemed very happy. But one night there was a great storm. The rains poured down in torrents until a flood, like a wild river, swept through the valley. The house that was built on the low ground--was carried away with its dwellers. The house on the bluff, however, was unharmed.

These two pictures explain themselves. He who built in the valley is the man who has only profession--but who has never really given his life to Christ, nor built on Him as the foundation. The other man who build on the rock--is he who has a true faith in Christ, confirmed by loving obedience. The storms that burst, are earth's trials which test every life--the tempests of death and of judgment. The mere professor of religion is swept away in these storms, for he has only sand under him. He who builds on Christ is secure, for no storm can reach him in Christ's bosom!

Blinding the Mind

Things That Matter Most: Chapter 23 - Blinding the Mind

By John Henry Jowett


THERE is a phrase of the Apostle Paul which contains a warning peculiarly relevant to the times through which we are passing. It is this: "The god of this world hath blinded the minds." What is the significance of the phrase, "The god of this world"? 

Here is a certain evil influence personified. A certain immoral energy or contagion is conceived and presented as an active, aggressive, personal force, which deliberately seeks to dwarf, and bruise, and lame the richly-dowered souls of men. He is elsewhere depicted as of princely line, with imposing retinues and armies, moving stealthily amid human affairs, and inciting men to rebellion against the holy sovereignty of God. He is represented as "the prince of the powers of the air," subtle and persuasive as an atmosphere, insinuating himself into the most sacred privacies and invading even the most holy place. He is "the god of this world," receiving homage and worship, the god to whom countless thousands offer ceaseless sacrifice, while the holy Lord of grace and glory is neglected or defied. 

I am not now concerned with this personification, whether it be literalistic or merely figurative; but I am concerned with the reality of the power itself, whose seductive energy corrupts our holiest treasures, and blunts and spoils the finest perceptions of the soul.

Now, everybody is familiar with the characteristics of this destructive ministry. There is no need of abstruse or hair-splitting analysis. The issues are obtrusive; we have only to examine our own souls and their besetments, and the peril is revealed. We may have dropped the personification, but we recognize the energy which is personified. We may have abandoned the figure, but we are familiar with the thing. 

We may no longer speak of "the god of this world," but "worldliness" itself is palpable and rampant. This is our modern phraseology. We speak of "the worldly" and "the unworldly," but unfortunately the terms are very loosely and indefinitely used, or used with a quite perverse significance. The "unworldly "is too often identified with the "other-worldly," and is interpreted as an austere isolation from all festivity, and from the hard, hand-soiling concerns of practical life. And on the other hand, "worldliness" is too often identified with gaiety, or levity, or prodigality, with drink and pride, with theatrical glamour and vulgar sheen. But these interpretations do not touch the heart of the matter. 

What, then, is worldliness? Worldliness is life without ideals, life without moral vistas, life devoid of poetic vision. It is life without the halo, life without the mystic nimbus which invests it with venerable and awful sanctity. It is imprisonment within the material, no windows opening out upon ethereal, moral, or altruistic ends. It is the five senses without the moral sense. It is quickness to appetite and dulness to conscience. It is engrossment in sensations, it is heedlessness to God's "awful rose of dawn." It is rank materialism.

Now this powerful contagion operates in the deprivation of sight. Materialism and moral blindness stand in the relation of cause and effect. "The god of this world hath blinded the minds." That is to say, a practical materialism destroys the eyes of the soul. The materialistic life deadens the conscience, and in the long run puts it to death. The materialistic life stupefies the imagination, and in the long run makes it inoperative. The materialistic life defiles the affections, and converts their crystalline lens into a minister of darkness and night. The materialistic life coarsens the spiritual instincts, and renders them non-appreciative of things unseen. And so it is with all the vision-powers of life; a practical materialism plugs or scales them and makes the spirit blind.

But I will still further narrow the interpretation, and confine this article to that aspect of worldliness which is concerned with the bare pursuit of material gain. If "the god of this world" must be given a single name, let the name be Mammon, and let the love of money be the worship which is offered at his shrine. And does the god of money blind the mind? Let it get into the pulpit, and everybody knows the result. The spiritual heavens become opaque, and there is no awe-inspiring discernment of "things unseen." Everybody recognizes its destructiveness in the ministry, but everybody does not equally recognize the destructiveness in other lives and other professions. But the moral issues are one and the same; always and everywhere the god of money blinds the mind.

Let me give a Scriptural illustration of its nefarious work. A woman, who had been spiritually enfranchised by the Lord, and who had been led out of the dreary, wan land of sin into the fair, bright lily-land of God's eternal peace, brought an alabaster box of ointment, very precious, and anointed her Deliverer's feet. And there was one standing by, who looked upon it with uninspired and unillumined eyes, and said, "To what purpose is this waste?" . . . "This he said . . . because he was a thief, and carried the bag!" 

He was the victim of the god of money, and he was blind, and he could see no beauty or grace in this passionate love-offering of an, emancipated child of God. There was nothing winsome about the woman that he should commend her; and, more than that, when he looked upon the woman's Lord there was "no beauty" that he should desire Him! "What will ye give me, and I will deliver Him unto you? And they covenanted with him for thirty pieces of silver." And for that "thirty pieces of silver" he sold his Lord! May we not add, "the god of this world" had blinded his mind?

But there is no. need for us to go back to those remote days for illustration of the truth. Every succeeding century has abounded in confirmation of its truth. But let me confine myself to witnesses from modern history. I know of no more shameful page in the history of our country than the page which tells the story of our early demeanour in the American Civil War. The North was valorously intent upon lifting the tyranny of the South, and letting the bond-slave free. And vast multitudes of our people sympathized with the callous and slave-holding South, and ranged themselves in bitter antagonism to the chivalrous North. 

And what was the explanation? 

Just this, they were unable to see the interests of humanity because of their interests in cotton. They couldn't see the slave for the dollar, or they saw him only as a chattel to be despised. Henry Ward Beecher came over to expostulate with our countrymen, and to seek to open their eyes. He came here to plead for the slaves--those slaves unveiled to us in the bleeding pages of "Uncle Tom's Cabin." He came to Liverpool. Now listen to a contemporary document and you will think you are reading the Press of the past few weeks. "It would be impossible for tongue or pen adequately to describe the scenes at the meeting. The great hall was packed to the crushing point. The mob was out in force. The interruptions were incessant: cat-calls, groans, and hisses." And at what part of the meeting did the disorder culminate? It was when Beecher, bit by bit, got out these sentences and rammed them home: "When I was twelve years old, my father hired Charles Smith, a man as black as lamp-black, to work on his farm. I slept with him in the same room. (Oh! oh!) Ah, that don't suit you. (Uproar.) I ate with him at the same table; I sang with him out of the same hymn-book; I cried when he prayed over me at night; and if I had serious impressions of religion early in life, they were due to the fidelity and example of that poor, humble farm-labourer, black Charles Smith. (Tremendous uproar.)" 

What think you of the significance of that uproar? They saw no moral dignity in Charles Smith that they should desire him. That Liverpool mob could not see the slave because they were so intent upon the dollar.

Read the chivalrous history of the good Lord Shaftesbury. In his early manhood, when he began his noble crusade of emancipation, women and girls were employed in coal-mines, as beasts of burden. Their condition haunted him, and became a nightmare which possessed him day and night, and he set about to ameliorate their lot. He sought to prohibit their employment. With what result? The mine-owners were up and in arms. "It spells ruin to our trade!" They could not see the degradation for the gold. They feared a shrinking purse more than a shrunken womanhood. They could not see the woman for the bank. But Lord Ashley disregarded their cries, and at length he had the supreme happiness of putting a stop to this infamous sort of labour by an act which declared that, after a certain limited period, no woman or girl should ever again be employed in our collieries and mines.

When Queen Victoria came to the throne, a dispute with China was developing into a very ugly menace. Soon after it broke out into open war. And what did we fight about? We fought for the right of Great Britain to force a destructive trade upon a people who did not want it, in spite of the protestations of its government, and in spite of all such national opinion as could find a public expression. There was money in it for Britain, there was revenue in it for India, and therefore China had got to have it! It is China's burden, China's curse, China's appalling woe, and still we force it on her. And the explanation is clear. We cannot see the evil for the revenue. We cannot see the wasting victim for the swelling exchequer. Some day Britain will get the gold-dust out of her eyes, and then she will see--she will see the reeking opium dens, and the emaciated manhood, and the devastated families, and the blighted race, and in her shame she will wash her hands of the traffic, and decree the emancipation of a people. At present, money plugs the eyes.

And there is very great need that in our own day we deliver ourselves from the servitude of this mammon. In our day, when the Spirit of God is at work in our midst, inciting dissatisfaction and unrest, and creating a ferment among the peoples, our vision and our sympathy can be dulled and checked by the common love of money. The peril is insidious, and it invades even the most holy place. 

The spirit of greed dwells not alone among the wealthy and the well-to-do, it can make its home with people of slender means. What we need, above all things, is to have our eyes anointed with the eye-salve of grace, that so our vision may be single and simple, and we may have the mind of Christ. What we need is unscaled sight, and with unscaled sight there will come fresh and healthy sympathies, and an eager participation in every chivalrous crusade.

Unseen Realities

By A.W. Tozer


Let us not be shocked by the suggestion that there are disadvantages to the life in Christ. There most certainly are. Abel was murdered. Joseph was sold into slavery, Daniel was thrown into the den of lions, Stephen was stoned to death, Paul was beheaded, and a noble army of martyrs was put to death by various painful methods down the long centuries. And where the hostility did not lead to such violence (and mostly it did not and does not) the sons of this world nevertheless managed to make it tough for the children of God in a thousand cruel ways. 

Everyone who has lived for Christ in a Christless world has suffered some losses and endured some pains that he could have avoided by the simple expedient of laying down his cross. However, the pains are short and the losses inconsequential compared with the glory that will follow, "For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory" (2 Cor. 4:17). But while we are here among men with our sensitive hearts exposed to the chilly blasts of the unbelieving and uncomprehending world it is imperative that we take a realistic view of things and learn how to deal with disadvantages. And it is important that we tell the whole truth to those we are endeavoring to win.

He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love."--1 John 4:7, 8

J. C. Philpot - Daily Portions

      "Love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God. He that loveth not knoweth not God; for God is love."--1 John 4:7, 8
     
      If ever you have loved Jesus with a pure affection; if ever you have felt him near, dear, and precious to your soul, that love can never be lost out of your heart. It may lie dormant; it does lie dormant. It may not be sweetly felt in exercise; but there it is. "If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maranatha" (1 Cor. 16:22). You would be under this curse if the love of the Lord Jesus Christ were to die out of your heart. But this love is often sleeping. 

When the mother sometimes watches over the cradle and looks upon her sleeping babe with unutterable affection, the infant knows not that the mother is watching its slumbers; but when it awakes, it is able to feel and return its mother's caresses. 

It is so with the soul sometimes when love in the heart is like a babe slumbering in the cradle. But as the babe opens its eyes, and sees the mother smiling upon it, it returns the smiles, and stretches forth its arms to embrace the bending cheek; so when the eyes of the soul are opened to see the smiling face of Jesus stooping to imprint a kiss of love, or drop some sweet word into the heart, and there is a flowing forth toward him of love and affection--this is the power of love.

"There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God." Psa 46:4

George H. Morrison - Devotional Sermons

      The River of God
    
      "There is a river, the streams whereof shall make glad the city of God." Psa 46:4
    
      The Bible opens the history of man by showing him surrounded by a garden. It is in the midst of a garden he awakes, touched into life by the creating hand. There he learns his kingship in creation; there he discovers One whom he can love; there he walks in fellowship with God. We read, too, that through the garden ran a river. It flowed from Eden through the midst of paradise. On leaving Eden it parted into four, and its streams went out to fertilize the world. This, then, is the environment of man in the idyllic morning of his days--a garden of perfect beauty and delight made glad by the flowing of a river.
    
      But as the history of man proceeds, of man in his relationship to God, the need arises of some other figure to illustrate the scenery of redemption. As long as man is unfallen, so long is a garden his true environment. There is no sin seeking to assail him, no hostile power bent upon his destruction. He can walk secure amid his garden groves and live without apprehension of assault.
    
      The City
    
      But with the advent of sin, all is changed. There grows an antagonism between man and God. The Church of God separates from the world and lives engirded by a deadly enemy. And just as this antagonism deepens, so does the thought of the garden become dim, and its place is taken in poetry and prophecy by the sterner concept of the city. For modern man the city is the home of commerce and its social life is the measure of its value. But in earlier times the value of the city lay mainly in the security it offered. And all who have seen a medieval city with its high walls and its defended ports will understand how in the day of trouble the city was the stronghold of the land. It was not to gardens that men fled for refuge when the trumpet rang its summons of alarm. They tilled their garden in the day of peace, but fled to the city in the day of danger.
    
      And so as the conflict of the spirit deepened and life assumed the aspect of a war, the garden ceased to represent the Church, and the battlement city took its place. That is why Scripture opens with a garden and closes its long story with a city. Slowly above the dust of spiritual battle there rose the outline of a city's wall, until at last, all that the psalmist hoped for and all that the prophet had declared in faith, was seen in vision by the seer in Patmos.
    
      Now this identification of Church and city was greatly furthered among the Jews by one thing. It was greatly furthered for the Jews by the increasing importance of Jerusalem. So long as the Israelites were villagers and lived a pastoral or rural life, just so long their concept of a noble city was drawn from what they knew of foreign capitals. But as Jerusalem began to grow in numbers and to attract the attention of the world, then the associations of the city took a kindlier and more familiar tone. No Jew could picture a city of his God so long as the greatest cities were all heathen. There must be a capital of his own land to suggest and to inspire the figure. And so it was, as Jerusalem advanced and became the home of government and worship, that both prophet and psalmist with increasing confidence described the Church as the city of Jehovah. It was not just of Jerusalem they thought, though under all they thought about lay Jerusalem. Jerusalem was the sacrament and seal of the invisible city of their quest. Hence John in the closing page of Revelation, when he describes the city of his vision, says, "I saw the holy city, new Jerusalem."
    
      Now between Jerusalem and other cities there was one point of sharp and striking contrast. Jerusalem stood almost alone in this. It had no river flowing by its walls. It was very beautiful for situation; and as a city compactly built together, it occupied a position of great strength, and its walls were a mighty safeguard round about it. Yet one thing it lacked to beautify its streets and to make it a safe shelter when besieged--and the one thing which it wanted was a river. Nineveh had the waters of the Tigris; through Babylon wound the streams of the Euphrates; the city of Thebes rose beside the Nile, and Rome was to win her glory by the Tiber.
    
      Jerusalem alone possessed no river; no depth of water flowed beneath her walls; all she could boast of, beside her wells and springs, was an insignificant and intermittent stream. It is that which explains the psalmist's exclamation. A river!--the streams of it make glad the city. He sees Jerusalem, yet it is not Jerusalem, for in his vision there flows a river there. Once there had been a river in the garden when the garden was man's meeting-place with God, and now the garden has become the city, and behold there is a river in the city.
    
      What then is this river which the psalmist sees in the city of Jehovah? There is no need for conjecture, for the psalmist himself tells us what it was: "God is in the midst of her," and he adds that it is the presence of God that is the gladdening river. It is Jehovah present with His Church that constitutes its gladness and refreshing.
    
      Living Waters
    
      I need hardly remind you how often in the Scripture God is compared with living waters. We read in Jeremiah, "They have forsaken me, the fountain of living waters, and hewed them out cisterns, broken cisterns, that can hold no water." Zechariah speaks of the fountain that shall be opened in Jerusalem for sin and for uncleanness. "And in the last day, the great day of the feast, Jesus stood and cried, saying, 'If any man thirst, let him come unto me, and drink.'" That, then, is the river in the city. It is the gladdening presence of Jehovah. It is God not distant in the heaven of heavens, but moving in the midst of our activities. For in that there is the secret of all strength, the hope of patient endurance to the end, and the gladness which is born of satisfaction of all that is deepest in the soul.
    
      Let us remember, too, what John says of this river, that it proceeds out of the throne of God and of the Lamb. It is not without deep significance that John should have added these words--"of the Lamb." There is a presence of God throughout the whole creation, for all things have their being in Him. That river flows from the throne of the Creator. But the river in the city flows from the throne of the Lamb; its well-spring is in Jesus and Him crucified; it is in Christ once slain and now enthroned that the city of God has joy and satisfaction. To His own city God reveals Himself, as He does not and cannot do unto the world. He comes to His own in the love of Jesus Christ, for he that hath seen Him hath seen the Father. And this is the river, not from the throne of God, but from the throne of God and of the Lamb, which flows and flows only through the city. This is that river which is full of water, and by the banks of which everything lives. This is the river which Ezekiel saw and which before long was deep enough to swim in. It is God, but it is God in Christ, the God of pardon and of full redemption. There is a river which makes glad the city, and it flows from the throne of God and of the Lamb.
    
      The River Speaks of Joy
    
      But now, to carry out the thought a little, let us take some suggestions from the figure. And, first, the river in the city speaks of joy. Between the ancient and the modern city there is one contrast we might easily miss. We view a city as the home of pleasure, as the place where most enjoyment may be had; it is in a measure to escape from dullness and boredom that multitudes leave the country for the town. But for the Jew, the city in itself was not regarded as a place of gladness; there was always something of a shadow on its streets. As a matter of fact, it is in country life that the Bible finds its images of gladness. The city was but a sad necessity in a country which might be swept by war. And the gloomier the city was, the better; for the higher and more impregnable its walls, the greater was the safety it afforded to men who sought its shelter in the strife. Not of a city such as we know today would a Jew think when he read of the city of God. He would imagine one that was impregnable and could defy the siege of any foe. And so says the psalmist, "Lo, there is a river"--the city of God is girded with walls unshakeable--yet through it flows the gladness of the hills and the joy of waters on which the sunshine plays. Safe is the man who dwells within these walls, for they are built by One whose workmanship is sure. His life is more than one of gloomy safety cut off from the liberty of plain and hill. At his very feet there flows a river, clear as crystal, making glad music, and he who stoops to drink of its clear stream is refreshed and made happy by its refreshment.
    
      But aren't there many who are tempted yet to think of religion as a life of gloom? They may feel that it is safe to be religious, but that that safety is very dearly purchased. The city of God is but a gloomy place, and some day they shall enter its defenses; but today let them have the gladness of the mountains and the music of the broad and happy world. To all who may be tempted to think so comes the word of the psalmist--"Lo, there is a river!" Not only is the Christian life the guarded life, it is the life that is lived beside the stream of joy. For to know that God is with us in Christ Jesus and that He will never leave us nor forsake us, that, after all, is the unfailing secret of the happy and contented heart. Everything lives where this river flows. The tree of life is growing on its banks. To live with God is to redeem one's life from the worry and the rush that make it not worth living. The city of God is not a gloomy place, however it may look to those without; there is a river in its streets that makes it glad.
    
      The River in the City Suggests Peace
    
      When you read the opening verses of this Psalm, you find yourself in a scene of wild confusion. The psalmist, in a few graphic words, pictures chaos in the world. The earth is reeling in the shock of earthquake; the mountains sink into the depths of the ocean; the waters of the sea rise up in fury and sweep with terrific force across the land. Everywhere there is uproar and confusion, an earth that is shaken to its very base, and men in terror and panic fear as if the end of all things was at hand. Then suddenly the psalmist calls a halt, and another vision breaks upon his gaze. A river! and it is flowing in sweet peace through a city that stands unshaken and unshakable. And nothing could be more striking or more beautiful than that swift passage from the roaring sea to the gentle gliding of that quiet river as it murmurs among the city streets. It is the psalmist's vision of the peace of all who have taken up their dwelling-place with God. This is a peace that the world can never give, for the world is in throes of earthquake and of storm. But it flows from the throne of God and of the Lamb; its source is a Savior crucified yet crowned; and it is the heritage of every man who believes in an enthroned Christ.
    
      The life of the Christian should be like a river flowing through the streets of a great city. In the midst of all disturbance and dismay it ought to be like a picture of sweet peace. For he who has God beside him night and day and who continually stays his mind on God, amid all the disturbing tumult of his lot, has a heart at peace with itself.
    
      The River in the City Suggests Prosperity
    
      We do not need to be told how a city's welfare depends upon its river. It is the Clyde that makes glad the city of Glasgow by bringing a livelihood to tens of thousands. There is hardly a dwelling on any street or terrace that is not influenced in some way by the river. Life may be hard enough for many citizens, but it would be harder and perhaps impossible if the sources of our river were to fail and its bed to become empty of its waters. On the Thames depends the prosperity of London, on the Clyde the prosperity of Glasgow; is it not equally true that on the river depends the prosperity of the city of God? For let the presence of God in Jesus Christ be withdrawn from the soul or from the church, and nothing can save that soul from being cast away or keep that church from the decay of death. No organization will avail if Christ is not present in its congregation. No wealth of learning, no beauty of ritual, is of the slightest use if that is lacking. Unless God is in the midst of her and His grace like a flowing river, the city of God can never hope to see the work of the Lord prospering in her hand. Brethren, for the sake of our own souls, and not less for the church which we belong to, let us covet more earnestly what is in our power, a life of unbroken fellowship with God. That is the victory that overcomes the world. That is the open secret of prosperity. That is the river from the throne of the Lamb that makes glad the city of our quest.
    
      A River With Many Streams
    
      In closing let us note one other word. The psalmist does not merely speak about a river; he pictures the river branching into streams: "There is a river the streams whereof make glad." Now the word translated "streams" is rather "brooks." It is used everywhere of lesser rivulets, and it brings before us the thought of the great river with its waters carried along a hundred channels so that each garden-plot within the city has its own tiny, yet sufficient, stream. It is thus that the river makes glad the city of God, not merely by flowing in a mighty tide, but by coming into every separate plot in a channel peculiarly its own. And so the question for each of us is this, "Is God indeed mine--is He my own? Have I opened a way for Him into my garden--am I personally acquainted with His grace?"
    
      It is not enough to live near the river and let it flow beside us in its beauty. God must be ours, and we must be His if we are to have the gladness of His presence.