He IS Coming

.....and the dead shall be raised incorruptible,
and we shall be changed. I Corinthians 15:52

Thou art coming, O my Savior, Thou art coming, O my King,
In Thy beauty all resplendent, In Thy glory all transcendent;
Well may we rejoice and sing:
Coming in the opening east
Herald brightness slowly swells;
Coming! O my glorious Priest, Hear we not Thy golden bells?

Thou art coming, Thou are coming;
We shall meet Thee on Thy way,
We shall see Thee, we shall know Thee,
We shall bless Thee, we shall show Thee
All our hearts could never say:
What an anthem that will be, Ringing out our love to Thee,
Pouring out our rapture sweet At Thine own all glorious feet.
 
Thou art coming, at Thy table We are witnesses for this;
While rememb'ring hearts Thou meetest
In communion clearest, sweetest,
Earnest of our coming bliss,
Showing not Thy death alone, And Thy love exceeding great,
But Thy coming and Thy throne, All for which we long and
     wait.

O the joy to see Thee reigning,Thee, my own beloved Lord!
Every tongue Thy Name confessing,
Worship, honor, glory, blessing
Brought to Thee with glad accord:
Thee my Master and my Friend,Vindicated and enthroned;
Unto earth's remotest end Glorified, adored, and owned.

- Frances Havergal  1836-1879

A Faith That Rests

For we which have believed do enter His rest...
the works were finished from the foundation
of the world. Hebrews 4:3

A great many people have the faith that seeks, but they
have not a faith that rests. The Lord Jesus is here, rest
in Him, let the burden go. "Lord I trust You now. I a-
bide in You now. Lord, as I think about my home pro-
blems, my business pressures, my personal difficulties
in every sphere of life, I bring them all, and give them
all to You." Believe that He keeps you. I am sure this
rest of faith is the center of all activity.

- Evan Hopkins 1837-1918

He Will Do It

He will do this   Psalm 37:5

I once believed that after I prayed, it was my respon-
sibility to do everything in my power to bring about
the answer. Yet God taught me a better way and
showed me that self-effort always hinders His work.
He also revealed that when I prayed and had confi-
dent trust in Him for something, He simply wanted
me to wait in an attitude of praise and do only what
He told me. Sitting still, doing nothing except trust-
ing in the Lord, causes a feeling of uncertainty, and
there is often a tremendous temptation to take the
battle into our own hands...

Often we fail to give God an opportunity to work,
not realizing that it takes time for Him to answer
prayer. It takes time for God to color a rose or to
grow a great oak tree. And it takes time for Him to
make bread from wheat fields. He takes the soil,
then grinds and softens it. He enriches it and wets
it with rain showers and with dew. Then He brings
the warmth of life of life to the small blade of grass,
later grows the stalk and the amber grain. After a
season Man harvests the ripened grain to make the
bread.

All this takes time. Therefore we sow the seed, till
the ground, and then wait and trust until God's pur-
pose is fulfilled. We understand the principle when
it comes to planting a field, and we need to learn
the same lesson regarding our prayer life. It takes
time for God to answer prayer.

- J. H. M.  Charles Henry MacIntosh 1820-1896

High Goal

Till we all come...unto the measure of the stature of the
fulness of Christ. Ephesians 4:13

Rehabilitation means the putting back of the whole human
race into the relationship God designed it to be in, and this
is what Jesus Christ did in Redemption. The church ceases
to be a spiritual society when it is on the lookout for the de-
velopment of its own organization. The rehabilitation of the
human race on Jesus Christ's plan means the realization of
Jesus Christ in corporate life as well as in individual life.
Jesus Christ sent apostles and teachers for this purpose--
that the corporate Personality might be realized. We are not
here to develop a spiritual life of our own, or to enjoy spirit-
tual retirement; we are here so to realize Jesus Christ that
the Body of Christ may be built up.

Am I building up the Body of Christ, or am I looking for
my own personal development only? The essential thing
is my personal relationship to Jesus Christ--
"That I may know Him."
To fulfill God's design means entire abandonment to Him.
Whenever I want things for myself, the relationship is dis-
torted. It will be a big humiliation to realize that I have
not been concerned about realizing Jesus Christ, but only
about realizing what He has done for me.

My goal is God Himself, not joy nor peace,
Nor even blessing, but Himself, my God.

Am I measuring my life by this standard or by anything
less? 

- Oswald Chambers

Worst Sinner Award

Jesus taught:

Do not judge, or you too will be judged. For in the same way you judge others, you will be judged, and with the measure you use, it will be measured to you. Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? —Matthew 7:1-3

Jesus instructs us not to judge others because it is not our place as humans to function as if we can know what only God can know about others. Even more, we cannot judge others because we ourselves are sinners who deserve judgment. Actually, the act of judging others subjects us to the same judgment we apply to them.

Instead, we are to consider our own sins to be logs and other people’s sins to be specks! We are finite, sinful human beings, and as such, we have no business setting ourselves up as the moral police of others, acting as though we know the state of people’s hearts and concluding that we are in any way superior to them.

Paul applied this to his life in this way:

Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners—of whom I am the worst. But for that very reason I was shown mercy so that in me, the worst of sinners, Christ Jesus might display his immense patience … —1 Tim 3:15-16

It doesn’t matter how minor society or religion may consider your specific sin. It doesn’t matter how major another person’s sin might be in the eyes of the culture or the church in comparison to your own sin. We are to consider ourselves as the worst of sinners. We are to volunteer ourselves for the “worst sinner award.”

If we don’t do this, we’ll remain entrapped by the addiction to the fruit of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil. That we are sinners and yet we judge makes us hypocrites, and our judgements are selective and self-serving. Left unchecked, these self-serving judgments will shape our lives and our relationships.

Therefore, when you catch yourself looking down on another person, remind yourself that whatever sin or imperfection you think you see in another person, it is a mere speck of dust compared to the tree trunk of sin and imperfection in your own life.

At the same time remember the truth that you have been completely forgiven and are engulfed in God’s love moment-by-moment. Out of the fullness of God’s forgiving presence with you and the love that God gives you, you are then empowered to extend this same love and forgiveness to whomever you are encountering, talking about, or even just thinking about. Try it and see what changes as a result.

—Adapted from Present Perfect, pages 113-114, and Repenting of Religion, pages 107-108

A Supernatural Transfusion

I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live;
yet not I, but Christ liveth in me...
Galatians 2:20

The true Christian life, which begins with a super-
natural transition, consists and continues in a
supernatural transfusion.

The very life and nature of Christ are transfused
into the innermost being of the Christian believer
by the Holy Spirit. Thus our Savior's word is ful-
filled: "Because I live, ye shall live also." John
14:19. Paul not only says, "I live, yet not I;" he
goes on to say, "but Christ liveth in me." There
is not only transition; there is transfusion. This is
the most precious sacred secret of the Christian
life. The man of the world neither understands it
nor even suspects it. Yet oh, how real it is to our
Lord's own!

Now just because of this supernatural transfu-
sion, the New Testament ideal for our Christian
life is that there will be within us a continual
displacement of the old self-life, and an ever-
clearer enthronement of the new Christ-life.
All of us, by nature, are ego-centric, self-cen-
tered; but we are meant to become Christ-
centered. Christ is to be the new life within
our life; the new mind within our mind; the
new will within our will; the new love within
our love; the new Person within our personality...

The whole of our consciousness is meant to
be penetrated with the consciousness of His
indwelling life and mind and will and love,
even as the air in Summer is transfused with
sunshine.

- J Sidlow Baxter (1903-1999)

The Bible

“Jesus doesn’t call us to a life of becoming progressively more and more like the Bible. Jesus calls us to a life of becoming more and more like him. The Bible is simply the vehicle to make the introduction. The goal has never been for us to live biblically. The goal has always been for us to live like Christ—and there is a massive difference between these two options.”

–    BENJAMIN L. COREY

Power Through Weakness

That is why, for Christ's sake, I delight in weak-
nesses, in insults, in hardships, in persecutions,
in difficulties. For when I am weak, then I am
strong.  2 Corinthians 12:10

The literal translation of this verse adds a startling
emphasis to it, allowing it to speak for itself with
power we have probably never realized. It is as
follows: "Therefore I take pleasure in being with-
out strength, being insulted, experiencing emergen-
cies, and being chased and forced into a corner for
Christ's sake; for when I am without strength, I
am dynamite.

The secret of knowing God's complete sufficiency
is in coming to the end of everything in ourselves
and our circumstances.  Once we reach this point,
we will stop seeking sympathy, because we will
recognize these things as the necessary conditions
for blessings. We will then turn from our circum-
stances to God, realizing they are the evidence of
Him working in our lives.

- AB Simpson 1844-1919

More on Solitude

God has made me a lonely person...I was always
a solitary soul, thinking more for, than with
people:  but it is good to be more alone--most
good, if it be more alone with Christ. What a
place that is!  John Darby

A little bird I am,
Shut from the fields of air;
And in my cage I sit and sing
To Him who placed me there;
Well pleased a prisoner to be,
Because, my God, it pleases Thee.
Jeanne Guyon  1648-1717

There will come a day when loneliness,
being misunderstood, rejection, will pass away
forever. There is a day coming when we will see
Him face to face. In the meantime He has said,
"I will never leave you nor forsake you."

Madame Guyon found herself in hot water from
an early age with both her mother-in-law and
the Catholic Church. Guyon was married off at
age fifteen by her parents. She was widowed at
age 28 having born five children, two of which
survived childhood.  She was imprisoned in
France because the Catholic Church thought her
teachings to be heretical. Guyon believed that sal-
vation is by grace alone and that it is possible to
pray without ceasing. Very radical!

Solitude

Thou shall hide them in the secret of thy presence. 
Psalm 31:20

All our best experiences come when we are alone
with God. There are sorrows which we can endure
in no other place. Grief is of many kinds, but all
grief that is really terrible and heart-crushing sends
us into speechless solitude to weep it out upon the
heart of God.

There are temptations which can be overcome only
when alone with Him. The fight with the adversary
is a solitary combat after all. And there are deep joys
that can come into us only when alone with God, the
joy of feeling Christ's personal love, the joy of find-
ing His strength made perfect in our weakness, the
joy of bringing our empty vessels to the Divine full-
ness of His grace, waiting till he fills them, and see-
ing them overflow...

We need deep communion with Christ if we are to get
it at all. There is no part of a tree so invisible as its
roots: but none more essential to its growth and fruit-
fulness: and just as the visible condition of the tree is
an unfailing index of what the unseen roots are doing,
our visible lives will soon tell whether or not our invi-
sible roots are going deep: for dryness below ground
soon means deadness above ground.

- G H Knight

Ambushed by Jesus

Press link:

Brennan Manning

Thy Way, Not Mine

Pray for us...that the Lord thy God may show
us the way wherein we may walk, and the thing
that we may do.  Jeremiah 42:2,3

Thy way, not mine, O Lord,
However dark it be!
Lead me by Thine own hand.
Choose out the path for me.

Smooth let it be or rough,
It will be still the best;
Winding or straight, it leads
Right downward to Thy rest

I dare not choose my lot;
I would not if I might;
Choose Thou for me, my God,
So shall I walk aright.

Take Thou my cup, and it
With joy or sorrow fill,
As best to Thee may seem;
Choose Thou my good or ill:

Choose Thou for me my friends,
My sickness or my health;
Choose Thou my cares for me,
My poverty or wealth.

Not mine, not mine the choice,
In things or great or small;
Be Thou my strength,
My wisdom and my all.

- Horatius Bonar  1808-89

We Serve a God of Second Chances

The God Who Creates

Why did God create? Was it because He was lonely? Because there was something deficient in Himself? To fulfill some need that He had? Far from any of these reasons. God created not because He was lacking but because He was overflowing—spilling over with the perfect fellowship between the three Persons of the Trinity from the very beginning.

It’s not uncommon for people to misunderstand the nature of the Trinity—one God in three Persons—to mean that at creation, God was the Father, then in Bethlehem, God became the Son, and then in the book of Acts, God became the Holy Spirit. This is not true and is actually an ancient heresy called modalism. Contrary to this, the Bible teaches that God has always existed in these three distinct Persons of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. Even more, the Bible teaches us that God created everything through the Son and for the Son.

“He [Jesus] is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation,” wrote the apostle Paul (Col. 1:15-17, CSB). “For everything was created by him, in heaven and on earth, the visible and the invisible, whether thrones or dominions or rulers or authorities—all things have been created through him and for him. He is before all things, and by him all things hold together.”

These verses work in concert with the account of creation from Genesis to show us this truth:
•Christ was “before all things.” He is not created; He is the eternal Creator. Whenever the beginning took place, He was already there making everything become a reality.
•Christ not only created all things but He also maintains the entire cosmos. He sustains the order in the universe. He holds it all together. Doesn’t this give you hope? If He holds the universe together, surely He can hold our lives together as Christians! Whenever we are tempted to give up hope, to feel like we can barely “hold it together,” like the world is spinning out of control, we ought to remember that God is God and we are not. Jesus holds everything together by the power of who He is!
•Jesus is the perfect image of the invisible God, the only One who rules wisely over creation perfectly relates to God and others, and through His work, earns our everlasting rest. By the Son, for the Son, and through the Son, all things exist and hold together.

It is through Jesus that all things were created; it is through Jesus that all things hold together, and it is for the glory of Jesus that everything exists.

The most basic implication this truth has for us is that we, like everything else in creation, exist through and for Jesus. It would be a drastic mistake for us, then, to read the story of the Bible as if we were the main character in Scripture. We are not. We are supporting players, and we only find true meaning and purpose when we align our lives with God for the glory of Jesus rather than trying to find how He fits into ours.

When we read the Bible, we should not be asking primarily how this passage or text relates to me and my story. Instead, we must read Scripture as the revelation of God that we might know Him and His Son. Consequently, our question shifts from asking what these verses say about me and my life to what this passage says about God and His story, and then how we fit into that overall narrative.

Jesus is the main character in Scripture. He is the center of the story. Everything revolves around Him.

- Tim Challies