REFLECTIONS

Payment in Blood

"A worn-out purple robe, once garment of the leader of a Roman cohort, is produced. This is thrown over His back still bleeding from every pore, while the barbarians exult aloud at this supposed witty and appropriate idea. They then break off twigs from a long-spiked thorn-bush, and twist them into a circle, which is afterwards pressed upon His sacred head as a crown. But in order to complete the image of a mock king, they put into His hands a reed instead of a scepter, and after having thus arrayed Him, they pay mock homage to Him with shouts of derisive laughter. The miscreants bow with pretended reverence to the object of their scorn, bend the knee before Him, and to make the mockery complete, cry out again and again, 'Hail, King of the Jews!' It is not long, however, before they are weary of this abominable sport and turn it into fearful seriousness. With satanic insolence, they place themselves before their ill-treated captive, make the most horrible grimaces at Him, even spit in His face, and in order to fill up the measure of their cruelty, they snatch the reed out of His hands and repeatedly smite Him with it on the head, so that the thorns pierce deeply while streams of blood flow down the face of the gracious Friend of sinners.

How can we reconcile such revolting occurrences with the government of a just and holy God! A great mystery must lie at the bottom of them, or our belief in a supreme moral government of the world loses its last support. And is not this really the case? What befalls Christ befalls us in Him, who is our representative. The sufferings He endures fall upon our corrupt nature. In Him we receive the due of our misdeeds. With the shudder at the sight of the martyred Lamb of God, ought to be joined adoration of the unsearchable wisdom and mercy of God and the glorious accomplishment of the counsel of grace. Our hell is extinguished in Jesus' wounds; our curse is consumed in Jesus' soul; our guilt is purged away in Jesus' blood. The sword of the wrath of a holy God was necessarily unsheathed against us; and if the Bible is not a falsehood, and the threatening of the law a mere delusion, and God's justice an idle fancy, not a single individual would have escaped the sword, if the Son of God had not endured the stroke and taken upon Himself the payment of our debts."

-From The Suffering Saviour by F. W. Krummacher  First English Edition 1856  Published by The Banner of Truth Trust  2004  Carlisle, PA.

REFLECTIONS

Hypocrites

"Some individuals make a lot of noise about their religion, but secretly have their hearts set on earthly goals. They pretend to be heaven-bound, but their hearts are full of hypocrisy. Such deceivers are like the eagle who, when he soars highest, has his eye fixed on some carnal prey on the ground.

Hypocrites have always been and ever will be a part of the crowd thronging into the church and mingling with the true saints of God, Their speech is pure, their service admirable; but their hearts are lined with deceit; worst of all, they fool even themselves. The world may mistakenly call them saints, but Christ knows they are devils. What did He say about the master hypocrite, Judas? "Have I not chosen you twelve, and one of you is a devil?" (John 6:70).

Truly, of all devils, none is as bad as the professing devil, the preaching, praying devil. God has repeatedly shown His severe displeasure when His so-called people have prostituted sacred things to worldly ends. Of all men, God strikes with the greatest speed the one who gilds over worldly and wicked business with holy pretensions. God has made a solemn promise: "I will set my face against that man, and will make him a sign and a proverb, and I will cut him off from the midst of my people, and ye shall know that I am the Lord." (Ezekiel 14:8).

Among thieves, there is often a scout who searches out where the booty is to be had. He is the brains behind every illicit operation, but he never risks his own neck by actually committing a crime. The devil uses this same tactic by watching how a Christian walks, where he goes, whose company he enjoys. The he decides the best way to rob him of his grace. When the plan is set, he sends someone else to carry it out. Thus he sent Job's wife to tempt him; he sent Potiphar's wife to entice Joseph."

-From The Christian in Complete Armor Daily Readings in Spiritual Warfare Published by Moody Press Chicago 1994 First Published in 1655.

Reflections

Thankful to Serve

“Be particularly thankful, O my soul! That God hath made use of thee for the service of His church on earth. My God, my soul for this doth magnify Thee, and my spirit rejoiceth in the review of Thy great undeserved mercy. O what am I, whom Thou tookest up from the dunghill, or low obscurity, that I should live myself in the constant relish of Thy sweet and sacred truth, and with such encouraging success communicate it to others! That I may say, now my public work seems ended, that these forty-three of forty-four years I have no reason to think that ever I labored in vain! O with what gratitude must I look upon all places where I lived and labored; but, above all, that place which had my strength! I bless Thee for the great number of them gone to heaven, and for the continuance of piety, humility, concord, and peace, among them.

Also for all that by my writings have received any saving light and grace. O my God, let not my own heart be barren, while I labor in thy husbandry to bring others unto holy fruit! Let me not be a stranger to the life and power of that saving truth, which I have done do much to communicate to others! O let not my own words and writings condemn me, as void of that divine and heavenly nature and life, which I have said so much of in the world!”

-From Dying Thoughts by Richard Baxter  First Published in 1683  Published by The Banner of Truth Trust  Carlisle, PA  2004.

REFLECTIONS

“1908 Convention-One Soul a Day

It was about this time that John Hyde laid hold of God in a very definite covenant. This was for one soul a day-not less, not inquiries simply, but a soul saved-ready to confess Christ in public and be baptized in His Name. The stress and strain was relieved. His heart was filled with the peace of full assurance. All who spoke to him perceived a new life and new life-work which this life can never end.

He returned to his district with the confidence; nor was he disappointed. It meant long journeys, nights of watching unto prayer, and fasting, pain and conflict, yet victory always crowing this. What though the dews chilled him by night and the drought exhausted him by day? His sheep were being gathered into the fold, and the Good Shepherd was seeing the travail of His soul and being satisfied. By the end of that year more than four hundred were gathered in.

Was he satisfied? Far from it. How could he possibly be so long as his Lord was not? How could our Lord be satisfied, so long as one single sheep was yet outside His fold? But John Hyde was learning the secret of Divine strength: “The joy of the Lord.” For, after all, the greater the capacity for joy, the greater our capacity also for sorrow. Thus it was with the Man of Sorrows, He could say: “These words have I spoken unto you, that My joy may be in you and that your joy may be full.”

John Hyde seemed always to be hearing the God Shepherd’s voice saying, “Other sheep I have, other sheep I have.” No matter if he won the one a day or two a day or four a day, he had an unsatisfied longing, an undying passion for lost souls. Here is a picture given by one of his friends in India: “As a personal worker he would engage a man in a talk about his salvation. By and by he would have his hands on the man’s shoulders, looking him very earnestly in the eyes. Soon he would get the man on his knees confessing his sins and seeking salvation. Such a one he would baptize in the village, by the roadside or anywhere.”

I once attended one of his conventions for Christians. He would meet his converts as they came in, and embrace them in oriental style, laying his hand first on one shoulder and then on the other. Indeed, his embraces were so loving that he got nearly all to give embraces to Christians, and those too, of the lowest caste.

This was his strong point. Love won him victories.”

-From Praying Hyde-The Life of John “Praying” Hyde  Bridge Publishing  South Plainfield, NJ 1982.

REFLECTIONS

Man's Highest Activity

"When a man is speaking to God he is at his very acme (acme is the highest point; summit; peak). It is the highest activity of the human soul, and therefore it is at the same time the ultimate test of a man's true spiritual condition. There is nothing that tells the truth about us as Christian people so much as our prayer life. Everything we do in the Christian life is easier than prayer. It is not so difficult to give alms...you can have a true spirit of philanthropy in people who are not Christian at all...The same applies also to the question of self-discipline-refraining from certain things and taking up particular duties and tasks. God knows it is very much easier to preach like this from the pulpit than it is to pray. Prayer is undoubtedly the ultimate test, because a man can speak to others with greater ease than he can speak to God. Ultimately, therefore, a man discovers the real condition of his spiritual life when he examines himself in private, when he is alone with God...have we not all known what it is to find that, somehow, we have less to say to God when we are alone than when we are in the presence of others? It should not be so; but it often is. So that it is when we have left the realm of activities and outward dealings with other people, and are alone with God, that we really know where we stand in a spiritual sense, it is not only the highest activity of the soul, it is the ultimate test of our spiritual condition."

­­­­..............

O the pure delight of a single hour

That before Thy throne I spend,

When I kneel in prayer, and with Thee, my God,

I commune as friend with friend

The outstanding characteristic of al the most saintly people that the world has ever known has been that they have not only spent much time in private prayer, but have also delighted in it...The more saintly the person, the more time such a person spends in conversation with God. Thus it is a vital and ail important matter...

This has been true in the experience of God's people throughout the centuries. We find it recorded in the Gospels that John the Baptist had been teaching his disciples to pray. They obviously had felt the need of instruction, and they had asked him...And John had taught how to pray. Our Lord's disciples felt exactly the same need... 'Lord, teach us how to pray.' Undoubtedly the desire arose in their hearts because they were conscious of this kind of natural, instinctive, initial difficulty of which we are all aware; but it must also have been greatly increased when they watched His own prayer life. They saw how He would arise 'a great while before dawn' and go up into the mountains to pray, and how He would spend whole nights in prayer. And sometimes, I have no doubt; they said to themselves, 'What does He talk about? What does He do?' They may have also thought, 'I find after a few minutes in prayer that I come to the end of my words. What is it that enables Him to be drawn out in prayer? What is it that leads to this ease and abandonment?' 'Lord,' they said, 'teach us how to pray.' They meant by this... 'We wish we knew God as You know Him. Teach us how to pray.' Have you ever felt that? Have you never felt dissatisfied with your prayer life, and longed to know more and more what it is truly to pray? If you have, it is an encouraging sign."

-From Martyn Lloyd-Jones's Writings A First Book Of Daily Readings Selected by Frank Cumbers Published by Eerdmans Publishers Grand Rapids, Ml 1970 Pages 59, 68.

REFLECTIONS

“NOT SAVED

"The harvest is past, the summer is ended,

and we are not saved"—Jeremiah 8:20

NOT SAVED! Dear reader, is this your mournful plight? Warned of the judgment to come, bidden to escape for your life, and yet at this moment not saved? You know the way of salvation, you read it in the Bible, you hear it from the pulpit, it is explained to you by friends, and yet you neglect it, and therefore are not saved. You will be without excuse when the Lord shall judge the quick and dead. The Holy Spirit has given more or less of blessing upon the word which has been preached in your hearing, and times of refreshing have come from the divine presence, and yet you are without Christ. All these hopeful seasons have come and gone—your summer and your harvest have past—and yet you are not saved.

Years have followed one another into eternity, and your last year will soon be here; youth has gone, manhood is going, and yet you are not saved. Let me ask you- Will you ever be saved? Is there any likelihood of it? Already the most propitious seasons have left you unsaved: will other occasions alter your condition? Means have failed with you—the best of means, used perseveringly and with the utmost affection—what more can be done for you? Affliction and prosperity have alike failed to impress you; tears and prayers and sermons have been wasted on your barren heart. Are not the probabilities dead against your ever being saved? Is it not more than likely that you will abide as you are till death forever bars the door of hope? Do you recoil from the supposition? Yet it is a most reasonable one: he who is not washed in so many waters will in all probability go filthy to his end. The convenient time never has come; why should it ever come? It is logical to fear that it never will arrive, and that, Felix-like, you will find no convenient season till you are in hell. Oh, bethink you of what that hell is, and of the dread probability that you will soon be cast into it!

Reader, suppose you should die unsaved, your doom no words can picture. Write out your dread estate in tears and blood, talk of it with groans and gnashing of teeth; you will be punished with everlasting destruction from the glory of the Lord, and from the glory of His power. A brother's voice would fain startle you into earnestness. Oh, be wise, be wise in time, and ere another year begins, believe in Jesus, who is able to save to the uttermost. Consecrate these last hours to lonely thought, and if deep repentance be bred in you, it will be well; and if it lead to humble faith in Jesus, it will be best of all. Oh, see to it that this year pass not away, and you an unforgiven spirit. Let not the new year's midnight peals sound upon a joyless spirit. Now, Now, NOW, believe, and live. "Escape for thy life; look not behind thee, neither stay thou in all the plain; escape to the mountain, lest thou be consumed.””

-C.H. Spurgeon 1834-1892

REFLECTIONS

Christ in His Glory

“See the gracious way He executes His offices. As a prophet, He came with blessing in His mouth, ‘Blessed are the poor in spirit’ (Matt. 5:3), and invited those to come to Him whose hearts suggested most exceptions against themselves, ‘Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden’ (Matt. 11:28). How did His heart yearn when he saw the people ‘as sheep having no shepherd’ (Matt. 9:36)! He never turned any back again that came to Him, though some went away of themselves. He came to die as a priest for His enemies. In the days of His flesh He dictated a form of prayer unto His disciples, and put petitions unto God into their mouths, and His Spirit to intercede in their hearts. He shed tears for those that shed His blood, and now He makes intercession in heaven for weak Christians, standing between them and God’s anger. He is a meek king; He will admit mourners into His presence, a king of poor and afflicted persons. As He has beams of majesty, so He has a heart of mercy and compassion. He is the Prince of Peace (Isa. 9:6). Why was He tempted, but that He might ‘succor them that are tempted’ (Heb. 2:18)? What mercy may we not expect from so gracious a Mediator (1 Tim. 2:5) who took our nature upon Him that He might be gracious? He is a physician good at all diseases, especially at the binding up of a broken heart. He died that He might heal our souls with a plaster of His own blood, and by that death save us, which we were the procurers of ourselves, by our own sins. And has He not the same heart in heaven? ‘Saul, Saul, why persecutest thou me?’ cried the Head in heaven, when the foot on earth was trodden on (Acts 9:4). His advancement has not made Him forget His own flesh. Though it has freed Him from passion, yet not from compassion towards us. The Lion of the tribe of Judah will only tear in pieces those that ‘will not have Him rule over them’ (Luke 19:14). He will not show His strength against those who prostrate themselves before Him.”

-Richard Sibbes 1577-1625 From his book The Bruised Reed