A willing people and an immutable leader

“Thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power, in the beauties of holiness from the womb of the morning: thou hast the dew of thy youth.” Psalm 110:3
Suggested Further Reading: 1 Kings 19:9-18
Christ shall always have a people. In the darkest ages Christ has always had a church; and if darker times shall come, he will have his church still. Oh! Elijah, thy unbelief is foolish. Thou sayest, “I, only I, am left alone, and they seek my life.” No, Elijah, in those caves of the earth God has his prophets, hidden by seventies. Thou too, poor unbelieving Christian, at times thou sayest, “I, even I, am left.” Oh! If thou hadst eyes to see, if thou couldst travel a little, thy heart would be glad to find that God does not lack a people. It cheers my heart to find that God has a family everywhere. We do not go anywhere but we find really earnest hearts—men full of prayer. I bless God that I can say, concerning the church wherever I have been, though they are not many, there are a few, who sigh and groan over the sorrows of Israel. There are chosen bands in every church, thoroughly earnest men who are looking out for, and are ready to receive their Master, who cry to God that he would send them times of refreshing from the presence of the Lord. Do not be too sad; God has a people, and they are willing now; and when the day of God’s power shall come, there is no fear about the people. Religion may be at a low ebb, but it never was at such a low ebb that God’s ship was stranded. It may be ever so low, but the devil shall never be able to cross the river of Christ’s church dry shod. He shall always find abundance of water running in the channel. God grant us grace to look out for his people, believing that there are some everywhere, for the promise is, “thy people shall be willing in the day of thy power.”
For meditation: Do you feel one of the few? God’s people may be nearer and more numerous than you imagine (Acts 18:9,10); even when we are very few, Christ is nearer than we sometimes imagine (Matthew 18:20).
Sermon no. 74
13 April (1856)
C.H. Spurgeon

The making of Christian character

  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~
(J.R. Miller)

It used to be a custom for travelers in Switzerland to bring home clusters of the edelweiss. The flower is not sought because of its beauty or for its fragrance--but in recognition of its hardiness and victoriousness in living and blooming under very difficult conditions. It grows on the Alps and Pyrenees, at lofty altitudes, where almost nothing else lives, and on crags difficult of access, and is among the hardiest of all plants. Thus the edelweiss becomes the symbol of noble life which . . .
  endures hardness,
  is victorious amid antagonisms,
  rises superior to obstacles.

The man who has never known hardship, who never has had to practice self-denial or make a personal sacrifice--may be the envy of other men whose lives have been one continual struggle. They may think that if they could have had his easy circumstances--that they could have made a great deal more of their life. But really, their opportunities in life thus far, has been far better than his. Christian character is made in the field of struggle and hardship--not in ways of ease and luxury.
Hindrances are opportunities.
Difficulty is a school for character.

Strength is the glory of manhood. Yet it is not easy to be strong--it is easier to be weak and to drift. It is easier for the boy in school not to work hard to get his lessons--but to let them go, and then at the last depend on some other boy to help him through. It is easier, when something happens to make you irritable, just to fly into a temper and to say bitter words--than it is to keep quiet and self-controlled. It is easier, when you are with other young people, and they are about to do something that you know to be unworthy, just to go with them--than it is to say, "I cannot do this wickedness against God!" It is easier to be weak--than to be strong. But weakness never leads to mature Christian character.

     ~  ~  ~  ~  ~

A welcome guest!

  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~


("A Few Sighs From Hell" or "The Groans of the Damned Soul" by that poor and contemptible servant of Jesus Christ, John Bunyan, 1658. Being an exposition of Luke 16:19-31, concerning the Rich Man and the Beggar, wherein is revealed the lamentable state of the Damned--their cries, and their desires in their distresses, with the determined judgment of God upon them. A good warning word to lost sinners, both old and young, to seek salvation by faith in Jesus Christ--lest they come into the same place of torment.)
"Although a wicked man commits a hundred crimes and still lives a long time--yet surely I know that it will be well with God-fearing men, who are reverent before God!" Ecclesiastes 8:12

Believer, it will be well with you!
Consider how safe, how sure, how happy are you!
For when others go to Hell--you must go to Heaven!
When others go to the devil--you must go to God!
When as others go to eternal prison--you must be set at liberty, and at ease!
When others must roar for sorrow of heart--you shall sing for the joy of heart!

Consider, you must have . . .
all your well-spent life to follow you--instead of all your sins;
the glorious blessings of the gospel--instead of the dreadful curses and condemnations of the law;
the blessing of the loving Father--instead of a fiery sentence from the righteous Judge.

Let death come when it will, it can do you no harm; for it will be but only a passage . . .
   out of a prison--into a palace;
   out of a sea of troubles--into a haven of rest;
   out of a crowd of enemies--into an innumerable company of true, loving, and faithful friends;
   out of shame, reproach, and contempt--into exceeding great and eternal glory!

For death shall not hurt you with his sting, nor bite you with his soul-murdering teeth; but shall be a welcome guest to you--in that it is sent to free you from your troubles which you are in, while here in this poor world.

"For to me, to live is Christ and to die is gain!" Philippians 1:21

"I desire to depart and be with Christ, which is better by far!" Philippians 1:23

     ~  ~  ~  ~  ~

Spiritual resurrection

“And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespasses and sins.” Ephesians 2:1
Suggested Further Reading: Colossians 2:9-14
Does it not seem a strange thing, that you, who have walked to this place this morning, shall be carried to your graves; that the eyes with which you now behold me shall soon be glazed in everlasting darkness; that the tongues, which just now moved in song, shall soon be silent lumps of clay; and that your strong and stalwart frame, now standing in this place, will soon be unable to move a muscle, and become a loathsome thing, the brother of the worm and the sister of corruption? You can scarcely get hold of the idea; death does such awful work with us, it is such a vandal with this mortal fabric, it so rends to pieces this fair thing that God has built up, that we can scarcely bear to contemplate his works of ruin. Now, endeavour, as well as you can, to get the idea of a dead corpse, and when you have done so, please to understand, that this is the metaphor employed in my text, to set forth the condition of your soul by nature. Just as the body is dead, incapable, unable, unfeeling, and soon about to become corrupt and putrid, so are we if we be unquickened by divine grace; dead in trespasses and sins, having within us death, which is capable of developing itself in worse and worse stages of sin and wickedness, until all of us here, left by God’s grace, should become loathsome beings; loathsome through sin and wickedness, even as the corpse through natural decay. Understand, that the doctrine of the Holy Scripture is, that man by nature, since the fall, is dead; he is a corrupt and ruined thing; in a spiritual sense, utterly and entirely dead. And if any of us shall come to spiritual life, it must be by the quickening of God’s Spirit, given to us sovereignly through the good will of God the Father, not for any merits of our own, but entirely of his own abounding and infinite grace.
For meditation: Have you passed from death to life by faith in the Lord Jesus Christ (John 5:24)? Better to be a nobody alive in Christ than a king dead in trespasses and sins (Ecclesiastes 9:4).
Sermon no. 127
12 April (Easter 1857)
C.H. Spurgeon

The instructions and writings of spiritual men

  ~  ~  ~  ~  ~


(Letters of John Newton)

"Examine everything carefully; hold fast to that which is good" 1 Thessalonians 5:21

Remember your exalted privilege--you have the Bible in your hands, and are not bound to follow books or preachers any farther than what they teach agrees with the Oracles of Truth. We have great reason to be thankful for the instructions and writings of spiritual men--but they are all fallible--even as ourselves. One is our master, even Christ--what He says, we are to receive implicitly--but we do not owe implicit subjection to the best of our fellow-creatures.

The Bereans were commended because they would not implicitly believe even the Apostle Paul--but searched the Scriptures to see whether the things which Paul taught were true. May the Lord give us a spirit of humility and discernment in all things.

"Now the Bereans were of more noble character than the Thessalonians, for they received the message with great eagerness and examined the Scriptures every day to see if what Paul said was true." Acts 17:11

     ~  ~  ~  ~  ~