REFLECTIONS

All Honor To God Only

“You crown the year with Your goodness.” Psalm 65:11.

(Spurgeon remembers the Lord’s goodness to the church.)

"I. And so our first head is DIVINE GOODNESS ADORED.  “You crown the year with Your goodness.”
 
Whatever of acceptable service we have rendered and whatever of real success we have achieved has come from the Lord of hosts who has worked all our works in us. Whatever holy results may have followed from earnest efforts and whatever honor has redounded unto God from them is the Lord’s doings and it is marvelous in our eyes. “Not unto us, not unto us, O Lord, but unto Your name be glory for Your mercy and for Your truth’s sake.” Your goodness, not ours, has crowned the work. Your goodness, indeed, it is which makes every good work good and gives to every good its crown. From its first conception, even to its ultimate conclusion, all virtue is of You. From blade to full corn, all the harvest is of You, O Lord, and to You let it be ascribed. Let us, therefore, praise the Lord with all our hearts for 25 years of prayer and effort, of planning and working, of believing and rejoicing which He has crowned with His goodness.
 
We will try to follow the run of the psalm and our first note shall be this--praise must be for God alone. “Praise waits for You, O God, in Zion.” Not for men, nor for priests, nor for pastors, presbyters, bishops, ministers, or whatsoever you choose to call them—“Praise waits for You, O God, in Zion.” Whosoever shall have done well in the midst of the church, let him have the love of his brethren, but let all the praise be unto You, O Most High. Far be it for the axe to exalt itself and forget him that fells therewith or for the sword to deprive the conqueror of his glory. Praise is silent while the best of men are passing by—it lays its finger on its lips till the Lord approaches and then bursts forth in gladsome song because He appears.
 
Whatever else you do, my brethren, be sure that your soul magnifies the Lord and abhors the very idea of self-glorification. If the Lord has blessed you, shake off, as Paul shook off the viper from his hand, any idea of ascribing praise to yourself. We are mere vanity and to us belong shame and confusion of face—these are, so to speak, our belongings—the only dowry our fathers have left to us. What are we that the Lord should bless us? Did you bring a soul to Christ the other day? Bless the Holy Spirit who helped you by His power to do so divine a deed. Did you bear bold testimony for the truth but yesterday? Bless Him who is the faithful and true witness, that at His feet you learned how to be true—and by His Spirit were enabled to be brave. “Not unto us! Not unto us!” With vehemence we deprecate the idea of honoring ourselves. Again and again we put away the usurper’s crown which Satan proffers us. How can we endure the base proposal? Shall we rob God of His glory? Even He from whom we derive our very existence? Perish, O pride, abhorred of God and man. O Lord, keep me from the approach of that shameful evil. Brethren, if you have any esteem among men, cast your crown at Jehovah’s feet and there let it be. All honor be to God only.”
 
-Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892)

REFLECTIONS

Joy at Christ’s Birth

“And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Savior, who is Christ the Lord. And this shall be a sign unto you: You shall find a Babe wrapped in swaddling cloths, lying in a manger.” Luke 2:10, 11, 12. (NKJV)

“First, then, THE JOY, which is mentioned in our text: from where comes it, and what is it? We have already said it is a “great joy”—“good tidings of great joy.” Earth’s joy is small, her mirth is trivial, but heaven has sent us immeasurable joy, fit for immortal minds. Inasmuch as no note of time is appended, and no intimation is given that the message will ever be reversed, we may say that it is a lasting joy; a joy which will ring all down the ages, the echoes of which shall be heard until the trumpet brings the resurrection. Yes, and onward forever and forever, for when God sent forth the angel in his brightness to say, “I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people,” He did as much as say, “From this time forth it shall be joy to the sons of men. There shall be peace to the human race and goodwill towards men forever and forever, as long as there is glory to God in the highest.” O blessed thought! The Star of Bethlehem shall never set! Jesus, the fairest among ten thousand, the loveliest among the beautiful, is a joy forever!

Since this joy is expressly associated with the glory of God, by the words, “Glory to God in the highest,” we may be quite clear that it is a pure and holy joy. No other would an angel have proclaimed, and indeed, no other joy is joy. The wine pressed from the grapes of Sodom may sparkle and foam, but it is bitterness in the end, and the dregs thereof are death. Only that which comes from the clusters of Eschol is the true wine of the kingdom, making glad the heart of God and man. Holy joy is the joy of heaven, and that you can be sure, is the very cream of joy; the joy of sin is a fire-fountain, having its source in the burning soil of hell, maddening and consuming those who drink its firewater. Of such delights we desire not to drink. It would be worse than damned to be happy in sin, since it is the beginning of divine grace to be wretched in sin, and the consummation of grace to be wholly escaped from sin, and to shudder even at the thought of it. It is hell to live in sin and misery; it is a lower deep still when men could fashion a joy in sin. God save us from unholy peace and from unholy joy! The joy announced by the angel of the Nativity is as pure as it is lasting, as holy as it is great; let us, then, always believe concerning the Christian religion that it has its joy within itself, and holds its feasts within its own pure precincts—a feast whose food all grows on holy ground.”

-C.H. Spurgeon  British Prince of Preachers  1834-1892

REFLECTIONS

“Deliverance from Dust and Chaff” 

"For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth." Amos 9:9

“The sifting process is going on still. Wherever we go, we are still being winnowed and sifted. In all countries God's people are being tried "like as corn is sifted in a sieve." Sometimes the devil holds the sieve and tosses us up and down at a great rate, with the earnest desire to get rid of us forever.

Unbelief is not slow to agitate our heart and mind with its restless fears. The world lends a willing hand at the same process and shakes us to the right and to the left with great vigor. Worst of all, the church, so largely apostate as it is, comes in to give a more furious force to the sifting process. Well, well! Let it go on. Thus is the chaff severed from the wheat. Thus is the wheat delivered from dust and chaff.

And how great is the mercy which comes to us in the text, "Yet shall not the least grain fall upon the earth"! All shall be preserved that is good, true, gracious. Not one of the least of believers lose anything worth calling a loss. We shall be so kept in the sifting that it shall be a real gain to us through Christ Jesus.”

-C.H. Spurgeon  British Prince of Preachers  1834-1892  From “The Check Book of Faith"

REFLECTIONS

A State Of Sin And Holiness

“Mark, now, I beseech you, what a state of sin, and what a state of holiness is.

He that is in a state of sin, hath habitually and predominantly a greater love to some pleasures, or profits, or honours of this world, than he hath to God, and to the glory he hath promised; he preferreth, and seeketh, and holdeth (if he can) his fleshly prosperity in this world, before the favor of God and the happiness of the world to come. His heart is turned from God unto the creature, and is principally set on things on earth. Thus his sin is the blindness, and madness, and perfidiousness, and idolatry of his soul, and his forsaking of God, and his salvation for nought. It is that to his soul, which poison, and death, and sickness, and lameness, and blindness are to his body: it is such dealing with God, as that man is guilty of to his dearest friend or father, who should hate him and his company, and love the company of a dog or toad much better than his; and obey his enemy against him: and it is like a madman’s dealing with his physician, who seeks to kill him as his enemy, because he crosseth his appetite or will, to cure him. Think of this well, and then tell me, whether this be a state to be continued in. This state of sin is something worse than a mere inconsiderate act of sin, in one that otherwise liveth an obedient, holy life.

On the other hand, a state of holiness is nothing else but the habitual and predominant devotion and dedication of soul, and body, and life, and all that we have, to God; and esteeming, and loving, and serving, and seeking him, before all the pleasures and prosperity of the flesh; making his favour, and everlasting happiness in heaven, our end, and Jesus Christ our way, and referring all things in the world unto that end, and making this the scope, design, and business of our lives. It is a turning from a deceitful world to God; and preferring the Creator before the creature, and heaven before earth, and eternity before an inch of time, and our souls before our corruptible bodies, and the authority and laws of God, the universal Governor of the world, before the word or will of any man, how great soever; and a subjecting our sensitive faculties to our reason, and advancing this reason by Divine revelation; and living by faith, and not by sight: in a word, it is laying up our treasure in heaven, and setting our hearts there, and living in a heavenly conversation, setting our affections on the things above, and not on the things that are on the earth; and a rejoicing in hope of the glory to come, when sensualists have nothing but transitory, brutish pleasures to rejoice in.

This is a state and life of holiness: when we persuade you to be holy, we persuade you to no worse than this; when we commend a life of godliness to your choice, this is the life that we mean, and that we commend to you. And can you understand this well, and yet be unwilling of it? It cannot be. Do but know well what godliness and ungodliness, what grace and sin are, and the work is almost done.”

-From The Practical Works of Richard Baxter, Vol. 1, page 14, Soli Deo Gloria Publications; Baxter lived from 1615-1691; he was an English Puritan Church Leader

REFLECTIONS

“The Prayer Of Love

Gracious Lord,

Thy name is love,

in love receive my prayer.

My sins are more than the wide sea’s sand,

but where sin abounds, there is grace more abundant.

Look to the cross of Thy beloved Son,

and view the preciousness of His atoning blood;

Listen to His never-failing intercession,

and whisper to my heart, ‘Thy sins are forgiven,

be of good cheer, lie down in peace.’

Grace cataracts from heaven and flows for ever,

and mercy never wearies in bestowing benefits.

Grant me more and more

to prize the privilege of prayer,

to come to Thee as a sin-soiled sinner,

to find pardon in Thee,

to converse with Thee;

to know Thee in prayer as

the path in which my feet tread,

the latch upon the door of my lips,

the light that shines through my eyes,

the music of my ears,

the marrow of my understanding,

the strength of my will,

the power of my affection,

the sweetness of my memory.

May the matter of my prayer be always wise, humble, submissive,

obedient, scriptural, Christ-like.

Give me unwavering faith that supplications are never in vain,

that if I seem not to obtain my petitions

I shall have larger, richer answers,

surpassing all that I ask or think.

Unsought, Thou hast given me the greatest gift,

the Person of Thy Son,

and in Him Thou wilt give me all I need.”

-A Puritan’s Prayer from The Valley of Vision  Edited by Arthur Bennett  Published by The Banner of Truth Trust  Carlisle, PA  2002

REFLECTIONS

Morning Has Broken

Morning has broken,
like the first morning
Blackbird has spoken,
like the first bird
Praise for the singing,
praise for the morning
Praise for the springing
fresh from the word

Sweet the rain's new fall,
sunlit from heaven
Like the first dewfall,
on the first grass
Praise for the sweetness
of the wet garden
Sprung in completeness
where his feet pass

Mine is the sunlight,
mine is the morning
Born of the one light,
Eden saw play
Praise with elation,
praise every morning
God's recreation
of the new day

-Morning Has Broken, a song, is the best known work of Eleanor Farjeon, children’s author and poet.

REFLECTIONS

“How Can Elsie Run?”

“How to Run and Box When You Are Over Eighty”

“Elsie Viren was for sixty-two years (1929-1991) on the staff of Bethlehem Baptist Church in various capacities generally called ‘church missionary.’ She was a rock of persevering faithfulness to Christ and his church.

“Near the end she lay with a slowly mending hip in the Augustana Home near the church. Her memory was limited and her eyes were dim. But she knew when we came, and she talked with customary spunk and courtesy and gratitude.

 “During her final illness, I preached two messages at the church under the theme ‘Olympic Spirituality’ (because the Olympics were on everyone’s mind). The Bible speaks of ‘running the race’ (Hebrews 12:1), and ‘not boxing the air’ (1 Corinthians 9:26), and ‘fighting the fight’ (2 Timothy 4:7), and ‘pommeling the body’ in athletic discipline (1 Corinthians 9:27). I asked the question: How can Elsie run? She does not look like an Olympic marathoner these days. How can Elsie box? Or does she even have to? Are running and boxing only for the fit and hardy?

“The answer is that we all must run, whether old or young, whether sick or healthy. And this is possible for the sick and senile because the race is run with the heart, not the legs, and the fight is fought with the heart, not the fists. It is a race and a fight not against other athletes, but against unbelief. It is possible for the aged and weak to win this fight because the fight is a fight against lost hope, not against lost health.

“Here’s the biblical evidence for this. In 1Timothy 6:12 Paul says to Timothy: ‘Fight the good fight of faith; take hold of the eternal life to which you were called when you made the good confession’ (RSV, emphasis added). The fight is a ‘fight of faith.’ It is not a fight to get out of bed, but to rest in God.

“It is not a fight to keep all the powers of youth, but to trust in the power of God. The race is run against temptations that would make us doubt God’s goodness. It is a fight to stay satisfied in God through broken hips and lost sight and failed memory. The race can and may be run flat on your back. In fact, it may be run and fought better by the paralyzed than by the able and seemingly self-sufficient.

“Again Paul said in 2 Timothy 4:7, ‘I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith’ (RSV, emphasis added). Finishing the race means keeping faith. It is a race against unbelief, not against aging.

“Another way to put it is that the fight is a fight to keep hoping in God. ‘[Christ will] present you holy and blameless and irreproachable before [God], provided that you continue in the faith, stable and steadfast, not shifting from the hope of the gospel’ (Colossians 1:22-23, RSV, emphasis added). Finishing the race means not giving up the hope of the gospel. It is a race against hopelessness, not against flawlessness.

“When we cheer on the diseased or aging runners who run their final laps in hospital beds, what we are really saying is, ‘Do not throw away your confidence which has a great reward’ (Hebrews 10:35). The finish line is crossed in the end, not by a burst of human energy, but by collapsing into the arms of God. And let us not forget: In the Christian race, we do not finish alone. We finish together. It is part of the rules. ‘Encourage one another day after day, as long as it is still called “Today,” so that none of will be hardened by the deceitfulness of sin’ (Hebrews 3:13). The more difficult it becomes for an older person to use the mind and the memory, the more we must fight with him and for him, wielding the sword of the Spirit where his own hand is weak. If any strays, we bring him back with mercy and meekness (Galatians 6:1; James 5:20). We encourage the fainthearted and help the weak (1 Thessalonians 5:14). We ‘visit the widows in their affliction’ (James 1:27)—whatever it takes to help them fight the fight and finish the race.

“Do you know an Elsie? Don’t leave her (or him) to fight alone. Remember that you too are in the body, and one day you will lie on your back alone, unable to read the Bible and barely able to think clearly to pray. Who will hold up your arm? Who will put the sword in your hand? Who will help you run?”

-From John Piper’s book Taste and See, entry 50, Published by Multnomah Publishers  1999

REFLECTIONS

Tozer’s Insights

“WE ARE TOO COMFORTABLE

And others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection. (Hebrews 11:35)

Is the fact that millions of Americans refuse to attend our church services only another symptom of original sin and love of moral darkness?

No, I believe that explanation is too “pat” to be wholly true.

Churches cannot deny they are too comfortable, too rich, too contented! We hold the faith of our fathers, but it does not hold us. God is trying to interest us in a glorious tomorrow and we are settling for an inglorious today. God has set eternity in our hearts and we have chosen time instead. We are bogged down in local interests and have lost sight of eternal purposes.

It was the knowledge that they were part of God’s eternal plan that imparted unquenchable enthusiasm to the early Christians. They burned with holy zeal for Christ, and felt they were part of an army which the Lord was leading to ultimate conquest over all the powers of darkness!

A LOWER LEVEL

O God, thou hast taught me from my youth: and hitherto have I declared thy wondrous works. (Psalm71:17)

There are leaders and there are churches within the Christianity of our day who will surely answer for their failure to apply the disciplines of the New Testament to the present generation of young people.

Much of Christianity today does not hold to the necessity for disciplines in the Christian life. If we have any of God’s concerns in our hearts, we must grieve over the lack of spirituality in the lives of great segments of professing Christian young people.

It is not my calling to assess blame. It is part of my Christian calling to proclaim the fact that no one, young or old, has the right to come to Jesus Christ and stake out their own conditions and terms.

Segments of Christianity have made every possible concession in efforts to win young people to Christ; but instead of converting them to Christ they have converted “Christianity” to them. Too often they have come down to the modern level—playing, teasing, coaxing and entertaining. In essence, they have been saying to them, “We will do everything as you want it,” instead of giving them Christ’s insistent word, “Take up your cross!”

THE WORLD IS SCARED

Look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh. (Luke 21:28)

A fear-stricken church cannot help a scared world; and it needs to be said that surely a fear-ridden Christian has never examined his or her defense!

No one can blame humans for being afraid. Beyond the continuing times of crisis and terror and violence, God has also warned that the world is in a baptism of fire, sooner or later. God has declared this by the voice of all of the holy prophets since time began—there is no escaping it!

Bible-reading Christians should be the last persons on earth to give way to hysteria. We have been given a prophetic preview of all those things that are to come to pass upon the earth. Can anything take us unaware?

We who are in God’s secret place of safety must begin to talk and act like it! We, above all who dwell on the earth, should be calm, hopeful, buoyant and cheerful. We will never convince the scared world that there is peace and assurance at the Cross if we continue to exhibit the same fears as those who make no profession of Christianity!”

-From Renewed Day by Day; Volume 2, by A. W. Tozer  American Pastor and Author  1897-1963

REFLECTIONS

Prayer and Praise

“PSALM LXXXVI.
A stream of continuous prayer flows through this Psalm. Praise is sweetly intermixed. Pleas for audience are urgently enforced. May we thus pray, and verily we shall be heard.

1. “Bow down Thine ear, O LORD, hear me: for I am poor and needy.”
The cry is the breathing of humility. To seek help from our own poverty is to draw water from an empty cistern. Let us fly to God’s fullness; it ever overflows.

2. “Preserve my soul; for I am holy: O Thou my God, save Thy servant that trusteth in Thee.”
Enemies are always near: God only can keep and save. Let us urge the plea, We are Thine by entire surrender of ourselves. All our confidence rests on Thee.

3,  4. “Be merciful unto me, O Lord: for I cry unto Thee daily. Rejoice the soul of Thy servant: for unto Thee, O Lord, do I lift up my soul.”
Mercy is our hourly need: for mercy let our hourly cry ascend. We shall hear joy and gladness, if on Him only our eyes are fixed.

5. “For Thou, Lord, art good, and ready to forgive; and plenteous in mercy unto all them that call upon Thee.”
When we thus call upon our God, we only ask for the display of His own heart. Goodness and mercy, grace and love there dwell. O God, give them scope. Let them come forth to help.

6, 7. “Give ear, O LORD, unto my prayer; and attend to the voice of my supplications. In the day of my trouble I will call upon Thee: for Thou wilt answer me.”
The cry continues, I cannot let Thee rest. I must take heaven by storm. Awake, awake in my behalf. Troubles abound. But they bear me on their tide to Thee. I come in full assurance that Thy promises shall never fail, and faithful prayer shall never be cast out.

8, 9, 10. “Among the gods there is none like unto Thee, O Lord; neither are there any works like unto Thy works. All nations whom Thou hast made shall come and worship before Thee, O Lord; and shall glorify Thy name. For Thou art great, and doest wondrous things: Thou art God alone.”
Precious is the season when the eye of faith contemplates the greatness—the majesty—the glory of our God. In heaven and throughout earth He sits supreme, worthy of all praise—all homage—all adoring love! In every clime enlightened servants now bow down to worship Him. The day will come when His knowledge shall cover the earth, even as the waters cover the sea. Then every knee shall bow before Him and every tongue shall magnify His name. O Lord, hasten the blessed time!

11. “Teach me Thy way, O LORD; I will walk in Thy truth: unite my heart to fear Thy name.”
How quickly the believer flies back to prayer. Here is his solace and his heart’s home. His grand desire is, that the Lord would instruct him in the path of life. He has no greater desire than to walk in God’s truth. He feels that his heart is prone in all its parts to wander. In itself it has neither cohesion nor stability. He prays that God would so restrain it by His bands, that no part should ever deviate from His fear.

12, 13. “I will praise Thee, O Lord my God, with all my heart: and I will glorify Thy name for evermore. For great is Thy mercy toward me: and Thou hast delivered my soul from the lowest hell.”
He vows that eternal praise shall issue from his comforted heart. Such glory is indeed God’s due. For through redeeming blood He has rescued from perdition’s lowest depths.

 14, 15. “O God, the proud are risen against me, and the assemblies of violent men have sought after my soul; and have not set Thee before them. But Thou, O Lord, art a God full of compassion, and gracious, longsuffering, and plenteous in mercy and truth.”
In contrast to this mercy the Psalmist sees the enmity of man. But he takes refuge in his God. His compassions never fail; His grace abides for ever; His long-suffering is inexhaustible; His mercy and truth are overflowing.

16, 17. “O turn unto me, and have mercy upon me; give Thy strength unto Thy servant, and save the son of Thine handmaid. Show me a token for good; that they which hate me may see it, and be ashamed: because Thou, LORD, hast holpen me, and comforted me.”
This view of God prompts the prayer, that He would arise and strengthen and save: and give such tokens of His loving-kindness, that all observers may perceive that believers are the blessed men receiving help from heaven, and rejoicing in the Spirit’s comforts. When such manifestations abound they cannot be hidden. Shame depresses the cruel adversaries. They are constrained to confess, that vain is their enmity when God extends His hand to work deliverance. May we be monuments of such help!”

-From Henry Law’s Daily Prayer and Praise  (1797-1884) 

REFLECTIONS

Going Home

“Breath the home atmosphere. Jesus tells us that the atmosphere of His home is love, “You loved Me before the foundation of the world.”

Brethren, can you follow me in a great flight? Can you stretch broader wings than the condor ever knew, and fly back into the unbeginning eternity? There was a day before all days, when there was no day but the Ancient of Days. There was a time before all time, when only God was, the uncreated, the only existent One. The Divine Three, Father, Son, and Spirit, lived in blessed consort with each other, delighting in each other. Oh the intensity of the divine love of the Father to the Son! There was no world, no sun, no moon, no stars, no universe, but God alone and the whole of God’s omnipotence flowed forth in a stream of love to the Son, while the Son’s whole being remained eternally one with the Father by a mysterious essential union. How came all this which we now see and hear? Why this creation; this fall of Adam, this redemption, this church, this heaven? How came it all about? It needed not to have been, but the Father’s love made Him resolve to show forth the glory of His Son. The mysterious volume which has been gradually unfolded before us has only this one design—the Father would make known  His love to the Son, and make the Son’s glories to appear before the eyes of those whom the Father gave Him.

This Fall and this Redemption, and the story as a whole, so far as the divine purpose is concerned, are the fruit of the Father’s love to the Son, and His delight in glorifying the Son.

Those myriads, those white-robed myriads, harping to music infinitely deep, what do they all mean? They are the Father’s delight in the Son. That He might be glorified forever, He permitted that He should bear a human body, and should suffer, bleed, and die, so that there might come out of Him, as a harvest comes from a dying and buried corn of wheat, all the countless hosts of elect souls, ordained forever to a felicity exceeding bounds. These are the bride of the Lamb, the body of Christ, the fullness of Him that fills all in all. Their destiny is so high that no language can fully describe it. God only knows the love of God, and all that it has prepared for those who are the objects of it.

Love wraps up the whole in its cloth of gold. Love is both the source and the channel, and the end of the divine acting. Because the Father loved the Son He gave us to Him, and ordained that we should be with Him. His love to us is love to the Son. “Not for your sakes do I this, O House of Israel; be ashamed and be confounded.” Because of the boundless, ineffable, infinite love of the great Father toward His Son, therefore has He ordained this whole system of salvation and redemption, that Jesus in the church of His redeemed might everlastingly be glorified. Let our saintly ones go home, beloved, if that is the design of their going. Since all comes of divine love, and all sets forth divine love, let them go to Him who loves them—let divine love fulfill its purpose of bringing many sons unto glory. Since the Father once made our Lord perfect by His sufferings, let Him now be made perfectly glorious by the coming up of His redeemed from the purifying bath of His atonement. I see them rise like sheep from the washing, all of them gathering with delight at the feet of that great Shepherd of the sheep.

Beloved, I am lost in the subject now. I breathe that heavenly air. Love surrounds all, and conquers grief. I will not cause the temperature to fall by uttering any other words but this—Hold your friends lovingly, but be ready to yield them to Jesus. Detain them not from Him to whom they belong.

When they are sick, fast and pray, but when they are departed, do much as David did, who washed his face, and ate, and drank. You cannot bring them back again, you will go to them, they cannot return to you. Comfort yourselves with the double thought of their joy in Christ and Christ’s joy in them; add the triple thought of the Father’s joy in Christ and in them.

Let us watch the Master’s call. Let us not dread the question—who next, and who next? Let none of us start back as though we hoped to linger longer than others. Let us even desire to see our names in the celestial conscription. Let us be willing to be dealt with just as our Lord pleases.

Let no doubt intervene, let no gloom encompass us. Dying is but going home, indeed, there is no dying for the saints. Charles Stanford is gone! Thus was his death told to me—“He drew up his feet and smiled.” Thus will you and I depart. He had borne his testimony in the light, even when blind. He had cheered us all, though he was the greatest sufferer of us all, and now the film has gone from the eyes, and the anguish is gone from the heart, and he is with Jesus. He smiled. What a sight was that which caused that smile!

I have seen many faces of dear departed ones lit up with splendor. Of many I could feel sure that they had seen a vision of angels. Traces of a reflected glory hung about their countenances.

O brethren, we shall soon know more of heaven than all the divines can tell us. Let us go home now to our own dwellings, but let us pledge ourselves that we will meet again. But where shall we appoint the trysting place? It would be idle to appoint any spot of earth, for this assembly will never come together again in this world. We will meet with Jesus, where He is, where we shall be-hold His glory. Some of you cannot do this. Turn from your evil ways. Turn to the right, where stands that cross, and keep straight on and you will come to Jesus in glory. Blessed be the name of the Lord! Amen.”

Charles Spurgeon’s Sermon #1892 ‘Why They Leave Us’

REFLECTIONS

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The End of Death, War and All Sin

1 Chronicles 26—27; 2 Peter 1; Micah 4; Luke 13

Several times Micah moves from a long section of denunciation and warning to a relatively short, positive vision of the future. Micah 4 includes one such vision (4:1-5), immediately followed by a description of how the daughter of Zion gets from here to there (4:6-13): she passes through severe testing and chastening, and emerges on the other side into the light of God’s blessing.

The opening verses depict a time when “the mountain of the LORD’s temple will be established as chief among the mountains; it will be raised above the hills, and peoples will stream to it” (4:1). Many mountains in the ancient Near East were sites for the worship of some god or other. To say that “the mountain of the LORD’s temple”—i.e., Zion—is established as “chief” among them and “raised above the others” is to say that the God of Israel has now eclipsed all other gods. The result is that not only does Israel stream back to the site, but “peoples” do so as well. “Many nations” exhort one another, saying, “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, so that we may walk in his paths” (4:2).

Then the movement of the oracle swings around from the centripetal to the centrifugal. “The law will go out from Zion, the word of the LORD from Jerusalem” (4:2b). The result is that justice prevails among many peoples, and war sinks away, swamped by peace as people, transformed by the word of God, “beat their swords into plowshares and their spears into pruning hooks” (4:3). The vision concludes with the only thing that can ensure its fulfillment: “the LORD Almighty has spoken” (4:4). So now, in his own day, Micah insists that genuine believers not be seduced by other gods, who could not possibly effect this transformation. This is the time to be faithful to the one, true God of the covenant. “All the nations may walk in the name of their gods; we will walk in the name of the LORD our God for ever and ever” (4:5).

The symbol-laden vision is cast in the categories of Micah’s day: the weapons of war, for example, become plowshares and pruning hooks, not tractors and combines. Though cast in terms of the supremacy of Mount Zion, there is no mention of an Israelite hegemony over the nations, nor of the Messiah or the sacrifice he would offer. Even the geography of the oracle looks a little different from the perspective of John 4:21-24. But in the light of the Gospel, the triumph of the new Jerusalem, which brings to an end death and war and all sin (Rev. 21:1-4), is that for which all Christians pray, the fulfillment of Micah’s vision.

           

From—For the Love of God—Volume 2, by D. A. Carson (Crossway Books, Wheaton IL; 1999)

REFLECTIONS

Repentance and the Law of God
 

“Joshua 16—17; Psalm 148; Jeremiah 8; Matthew 22

At each stage of Jeremiah’s description of the rebellion of God’s people, some facets of their sin are reiterated while others are refined and some new ones introduced. Here I will focus on two of the latter (Jer. 8).

First, Jeremiah focuses on the sheer unnaturalness of the people’s unwillingness to learn from their mistakes and repent. The presentation of the argument turns in part on a pun: The Hebrew word for “turn” or “repent” is the same as that rendered “return.” The point is that in ordinary experience someone who “turns away,” i.e., who makes a mistake, eventually returns, learning from the experience. But Israel always turns away (8:4)—they never learn from their bitter experiences. That is because they cherish their sin, they “cling to deceit; they refuse to return” (8:5). “No one repents of his wickedness, saying, ‘What have I done?’” (8:6).         

First-time readers of the Old Testament sometimes wonder how people can be so thick as not to learn from the repeated cycles of rebellion and punishment. Rats in a maze learn to adapt to external stimuli; to some extent, well-brought-up children learn to conform to cultural expectations and hide their worst instincts. Why doesn’t Judah learn from the history of the northern kingdom? Or even from her own checkered history? Although some behavioral modification can be achieved by training, biblical history demonstrates that the problem is bound up with human nature. We are a fallen breed. Sinners will sin. Creeds and covenants and vows and liturgy may domesticate the beast for a while, but what we are will not forever be suppressed. Israel’s history demonstrates the point, not because Israel is the worst of all races, but because Israel is typically human—and fallen. Even people as privileged, chosen, and graced as these cannot escape downward spirals. How naïve for us to think we can!         

Second, not only do many of these people foolishly think they are “safe” because they “have the law of the LORD” even though they do not obey it (8:8—a common theme in the prophets), but in this case the problem is massively exacerbated by “the lying pen of the scribes” who have “handled it falsely” (8:8). This is the first Old Testament reference to “scribes” as a class—and the people whose duty it is to study, preserve, and expound the Scriptures mishandle them. Perhaps they pick up elements they like and create a synthesis that pleases them, ignoring the whole; perhaps they deploy clever techniques to make the Law say what their presuppositions and theology demand. Sound familiar?”

From—For the Love of God—Volume 2, by D. A. Carson (Crossway Books, Wheaton IL; 1999)

REFLECTIONS

God’s Judgment Of The Nations

“1 Chronicles 1—2; Hebrews 8; Amos 2; Psalm 145

Woe to China. In this century she has butchered fifty million of her own people in the name of equality. Proud and haughty, she maintains an official atheistic stance, persecuting the church while that church, nurtured by the blood of the martyrs, has in half a century multiplied fifty times.

Woe to Russia. In the second decade of this century she embarked on a massive social experiment that resulted in the deaths of more than forty million people. She subjugated nation after nation, so certain was she that the tide of history was on her side. She became excellent at producing “the revolutionary man,” but could not produce the promised “new man” of Marxist thought, and so hid behind illusions and lies until her economic incompetence brought her down.

Woe to Germany. Privileged to serve as home to some of the greatest Reformers, she became extraordinarily arrogant intellectually, and in this century started two world wars that wreaked death and havoc, including the horrors of the Nazis, on countless millions. Today she builds excellent BMWs but has a materialist soul, worshiping nothing greater than the deutsche mark.

Woe to Great Britain. At one time ruler of one-quarter of the world’s population; inheritor of some of the greatest Christian thought and literature ever produced, she became ever more proud and condescending to the nations she colonized and the people she enslaved. Having repeatedly squandered a heritage of the knowledge of God, she thrashes around directionless and degraded.

Woe to Canada. She likes to think of herself as morally superior to her nearest neighbor, while hiding under the U.S. military umbrella. Sliding toward a moral abyss, her Supreme Court issues decisions that are as morally corrosive as any in the Western world, while the English-French factionalism drives toward enmity and breakup for want of courtesy and respect from both sides.

Woe the United States. She prides herself on being the only world power left, but never reflects on how God has brought low every world power in history. Her cherished freedoms, so great a heritage, have increasingly become a façade to hide and then defend the grossest immorality and selfishness. To the nation at large, no issue, absolutely none, is more important than the state of the economy.

This is the reasoning of Amos. In Amos 1, he circles around the pagan neighbors, articulating the judgment of God. Here in Amos 2, he moves to Moab, Judah (“Canada”), and finally brings it home to Israel. Israelite audiences would begin with smug contentment during the early parts: how would they end up? And understand: the sequence of my “Woes,” above, could have been rearranged to end with any country—with your country.”

           

From—For the Love of God—Volume 2, by D. A. Carson (Crossway Books, Wheaton IL; 1999)

               

REFLECTIONS

What Love Is This…

In Hind’s Feet on High Places (Hannah Hurnard; Tyndale House Publishers; 1975), Much-Afraid is beginning her journey to the High Places. The Shepherd is taking her to the foot of the mountain and she is marveling at the wildflowers.

“Much-Afraid looked at him earnestly. “I have often wondered about the wildflowers,” she said. “It does seem strange that such unnumbered multitudes should bloom in the wild places of the earth where perhaps nobody ever sees them and the goats and cattle can walk over them and crush them to death. They have so much beauty and sweetness to give and no one on whom to lavish it, nor who will even appreciate it.”

The look the Shepherd turned on her was very beautiful. “Nothing my Father and I have made is ever wasted,” he said quietly, “and the little wild flowers have a wonderful lesson to teach. They offer themselves so sweetly and confidently and willingly, even if it seems that there is no one to appreciate them. Just as though they sang a joyous little song to themselves, that it is so happy to love, even though one is not loved in return.

“I must tell you the truth, Much-Afraid, which only the few understand. All the fairest beauties in the human soul, its greatest victories, and its most splendid achievements are always those which no one else knows anything about, or can only dimly guess at. Every inner response of the human heart to Love and every conquest over self-love is a new flower on the tree of Love.

“Many a quiet, ordinary, and hidden life, unknown to the world, is a veritable garden in which Love’s flowers and fruits have come to such perfection that it is a place of delight where the King of Love himself walks and rejoices with his friends. Some of my servants have indeed won great visible victories and are rightly loved and reverenced by other men, but always their greatest victories are like the wild flowers, those which no one knows about. Learn this lesson now, down here in the valley, Much-Afraid, and when you get to the steep places of the mountains it will comfort you.””

REFLECTIONS

"While with Ceaseless Course the Sun", a hymn by John Newton, 1725-1807

“While with ceaseless course the sun
Hasted through the former year,
Many souls their race have run,
Nevermore to meet us here;
Fixed in an eternal state,
They have done with all below.
We a little longer wait,
But how little, none can know.

As the winged arrow files
Speedily the mark to find;
As the lightning from the skies
Darts and leaves no trace behind,
Swiftly thus our fleeting days
Bear us down life's rapid stream.
Upward, Lord, our spirits raise;
All below is but a dream.

Thanks for mercies past receive,
Pardon of our sins renew;
Teach us henceforth how to live
With eternity in view.
Bless Thy Word to young and old,
Fill us with a Savior's love;
And when life's short tale is told,
May we dwell with Thee above.”

REFLECTIONS

“2 Chronicles 34; Revelation 20; Malachi 2; John 19
 

One of the signs that a culture is coming apart is that its people do not keep their commitments. When those commitments have been made to or before the Lord, as well as to one another, the offense is infinitely compounded.

There is something attractive and stable about a society in which, if a person gives his or her word, you can count on it. Huge deals can be sealed with a handshake because each party trusts the other. Marriages endure. People make commitments and keep them. Of course, from the vantage point of our relatively faithless society, it is easy to mock the picture I am sketching by finding examples where that sort of world may leave a person trapped in a brutal marriage or a business person snookered by an unscrupulous manipulator. But if you focus on the hard cases and organize a society on growing cynicism, you foster selfish individualism, faithlessness, irresponsibility, cultural instability, crookedness, and multiplied armies of lawyers. And sooner or later you will deal with an angry God.

For God despises faithlessness (Mal. 2:1-17). Within the postexilic covenant community of ancient Israel, some of the worst examples of such faithlessness were bound up with the explicitly religious dimensions of the culture—but not all of them:

(1) The lips of the priest should “preserve knowledge” and “from his mouth men should seek instruction—because he is the messenger of the LORD Almighty” (2:7). The priest was to revere God and stand in awe of his name (2:5), convey true instruction (2:6), and maintain the way of the covenant (2:8). But because the priests have proved faithless at all of this, God will cause them to be despised and humiliated before all the people (2:9). So why is it today that ministers of the Gospel are rated just above used car salesmen in terms of public confidence?

(2) As do some other prophets (e.g., Ezek. 16, 23), Malachi portrays spiritual apostasy in terms of adultery (2:10-12).

(3) Unsurprisingly, faithlessness in the spiritual arena is accompanied by faithlessness in marriages and the home (2:13-16). Oh, these folk can put on quite a spiritual display, weeping and calling down blessings from God. But God simply does not pay any attention. Why not? “It is because the Lord is acting as the witness between you and the wife of your youth, because you have broken faith with her, though she is your partner, the wife of your marriage covenant” (2:14).

(4) More generically, these people have wearied the Lord with their endless casuistry, their moral relativism (2:17).

“So guard yourself in your spirit, and do not break faith” (2:16).”

From—For the Love of God—Volume 2, by D. A. Carson (Crossway Books, Wheaton IL; 1999)

REFLECTIONS

“He Remembers No More

“For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more.” –Jeremiah 31:34

When we know the Lord, we receive the forgiveness of sins. We know Him as the God of Grace, passing by our transgressions. What a joyful discovery is this!

But how divinely is this promise worded: the Lord promises no more to remember our sins! Can God forget? He says He will, and He means what He says. He will regard us as though we had never sinned. The great atonement so effectually removed all sin that it is to the mind of God no more in existence. The believer is now in Christ Jesus, as accepted as Adam in his innocence; yea, more so, for he wears a divine righteousness, and that of Adam was but human.

The Great Lord will not remember our sins so as to punish them, or so as to love us one atom the less because of them. As a debt when paid ceases to be a debt, even so doth the Lord make a complete obliteration of the iniquity of His people.

When we are mourning over our transgressions and shortcomings, and this is our duty as long as we live, let us at the same time rejoice that they will never be mentioned against us. This makes us hate sin. God’s free pardon makes us anxious never again to grieve Him by disobedience.”

-From, Faith’s Check Book, by Charles Spurgeon  1834-1892 British prince of Preachers  (Whitaker House, PA; 1992); page 111.

REFLECTIONS

Delivered for Our Offenses, Raised for Our Justification

 
“First, then, dear friends, our forgiveness comes from the death of Christ: “Who was delivered for our offenses.” There is no pardon of sin apart from Christ being delivered for our offenses. Of late I have heard things that I never dreamed of before, alleged even by professedly Christian ministers against the fundamental doctrines of God’s Word; and some have even dared to say that the substitution of Christ, His suffering in our place, was not just. Then they have added that God forgives sin without any atonement whatever, but, if the first is not just, what shall I say of the second? If God continually forgives sin without taking any care of His moral government, if there is nothing done for the vindication of His justice, how shall the Judge of all the earth do right? Then, the very foundations of the universe would be removed, and what would the righteous do? Depend upon this, whatever modern philosophy may say, “Without shedding of blood there is no remission of sins,” that is to say, without an atonement, and an Atonement consisting of the giving up of a life of infinite value, there is no passing by of human transgression.

But I find, next, we are told that being thus saved from sin by Christ’s death, we are justified by His resurrection: “Who was raised again for our justification.” What does this mean? I sometimes tell you that Jesus Christ was put in the prison of the grave as a Hostage for us. He had paid our debt, but He must wait in the grave till the certificate that the debt was paid was registered in the court of heaven. That being done for three days and nights—roughly so styled, but very short all of them—down flew the bright messenger from heaven, bearing the writ and warrant that the Hostage must go free, for the debt was paid, and the whole liability was discharged. Then the stone was rolled away; and when the angel had rolled it away, what did he do? He went and sat down upon it. It always seems to me that, when the angel sat down there, he seemed to say, “Now, death and hell, roll the stone back if you can;” but they could not. The keepers fled far away, and Jesus Christ Himself came out to newness of life; and now both the sinner and his Substitute are cleared, the captive and the Hostage are both set free, he that owed the debt is cleared by his Substitute, and the Substitute Himself is cleared, for He has paid all that infinite justice could demand, and He has received a clean bill of deliverance. Thus He comes forth out of durance vile, raised from the dead by His Father’s hand. That resurrection is your justification. Now, just look at this matter for a minute in another way. Suppose that Jesus Christ had never risen, and I were to tell you that He had made a complete atonement, and died for our sins, but that He was still dead, and in that grave; why, if you believed the message, you would always be troubled! You could not feel any confidence in a dead Christ; you would say, “He sees corruption, yet the true Christ was never to see corruption. He is dead; and what can a dead Christ do for us?” Beloved, the dying Christ has purchased for us our justification, but the risen Christ will see that we get it. The risen Christ has come to bring it to us, and herein we rest. Oh, that you would all rest in the finished work of Jesus on the cross, which is set forth to you in all its brightness by His rising again from the dead! Put the two parts of our text together, “Who was delivered for our offenses,” “and was raised again for our justification.” You need them both; trust in them both; trust in the Savior who died upon the cross, and trust in the Christ who rose again, and is now the living Christ; trust, in fact, in Christ as He revealed Himself to John in Patmos: “I am He that lives, and was dead; and behold, I am alive forevermore, Amen; and have the keys of hell and of death.” Lord Jesus, as such we trust You, as such we trust You now, and we are saved!"

-C.H. Spurgeon  British Prince of Preachers 1834-1892

REFLECTIONS

"Are We Set Apart To Jesus?

“2 Chronicles 19—20; Revelation 8; Zechariah 4; John 7

Rather naively, some of us think that if Jesus were alive today, our tolerant culture would not give him a really rough time, much less crucify him. We would simply marginalize him, treat him as if he were a harmless eccentric. Is that true? Not according to John. The issues are bound up with the nature of fallenness and its response to holiness.

Nowhere is this clearer than in John 7:7. Jesus’ brothers have been egging him on to return to Jerusalem. If he wishes to become a celebrity, they argue, he must show himself in the capital city on the high feast days. They are thinking like politicians: what will bring you public notice? But Jesus says that the “right time” for him has not yet come. They can follow their own timetable; he does and says only what his Father gives him to do and say (7:6; cf. 5:19ff.). Eventually he will go up to the Feast, but not yet (7:8). And when he does go, he goes quietly, without fanfare (7:10), refusing to draw attention to himself, with all the political fuss that would make. One important reason for this self-restraint is provided in 7:7: “The world cannot hate you,” Jesus tells his brothers, “But it hates me because I testify that what it does is evil.”

Four brief reflections. (a) The “because” clause is both disturbing and revealing. The assumption, of course, is that the world is not only evil, but desperately hates to have its evil exposed, shown up for what it is. Both by his flawless character and by his candid speech, Jesus makes “the world” horribly uncomfortable. How long would Jesus have lasted in Stalin’s Russia? In Hitler’s Germany? Or in Northern Ireland? Or the Balkans? Or in the United States? The least we would do, I imagine, is have him committed for psychiatric evaluation. (b) But I doubt that it would end there. Consider just one small arena: Some of my friends have had their lives repeatedly threatened because they publically oppose homosexual marriages. These are not homophobes or gay bashers. Some of them have proven wonderfully fruitful and loving in their ministries to gays and straights alike. Were Jesus ministering among us today, I have no doubt that such death threats would have become assassination. (c) The implication of 7:7 is that Jesus’ brothers belong to the world. That is why they fit in so well. Are we being faithful if no one hates us? (d) This candid exposure of the world is not smug one-upmanship, disgusting self-righteousness. Jesus is righteous; he is holy. Where sin and holiness collide, there will always be an explosion. And we sinners must come to recognize our deep sinfulness, or we will never turn to the Savior for help.”

-D.A. Carson  American Theologian and Professor  1946-

REFLECTIONS

Justification

“1 Chronicles 29; 2 Peter 3; Micah 6; Luke 15

There is important common ground in Micah 6 and Luke 15. Yet I shall approach it obliquely.

One of the slogans of the Reformation was simul justus et peccator, a Latin phrase meaning something like “simultaneously just[ified] and a sinner.” It was a way of getting at the legal nature of justification as expounded by Paul. On the ground of Christ’s death, God declares guilty sinners just—not because, from the act of justification itself, they are in their actions and thoughts truly just or righteous, but because they have been acquitted before the bar of God’s justice. Because Christ has paid their penalty, they are just in God’s eyes, even though, at the level of their very being, they are sinners still. Nevertheless, the Reformers never argued that justification stands by itself. Justification is part of salvation, but it is not all of it. The Holy Spirit brings conviction of sin and regeneration; the ultimate step is the final transformation of God’s people in body and spirit at the last day. These elements and more belong together, and all who are truly saved ultimately experience all of them. So while justification in and of itself leaves a person a sinner still, justification never operates all by itself. Genuine salvation not only forgives but transforms us.

Micah understands this. He does not so much deal with the ground of Israel’s acceptance before God (which is finally tied to God’s grace, Deut. 9) as insist that, if the covenantal relationship with God is genuine, it will not be soaked in idolatry, syncretism, and injustice. So how shall I come before the Lord? Shall I sacrifice the prescribed yearling? (6:6). How about thousands of rams? Or how about sacrificing my own son: will that pay for “the sin of my soul” (6:7)? What the Lord requires is this: “To act justly and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God” (6:8).

Micah is not alone on this point, of course. Jesus preached something similar, quoting Hosea (Matt. 9:13). Paul insists that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God (1 Cor. 6:9-11). He does not mean that only the perennial goody-goody will make it, for he goes on to say that some of his readers once practiced astonishing evil. But if they have been truly saved, transformation must manifest itself. That is equally true in the parable of the lost son (Luke 15:11-27). He is received by the father’s grace. Yet in the complexity of the return, the son abandons his sin even as he casts himself on his father’s mercy. As critically important as simul justus et peccator is, it must never, never be used to justify the practice of sin.”

-D.A. Carson   American Theologian and Professor   1946-