All For Christ # 2
But what is it to do all "in the name of Christ"? Let us first look at it NEGATIVELY. It teaches me that I must not act at random. Many are led by the impulse of the moment. They are driven hither and thither by every wind. To do this, is to be as a ship without a rudder - sure one day to be wrecked on the rocks or the quicksands. It is to be as a carriage going down a hill without a hand to direct the horses. It is to be as a train rushing on without a driver, until some terrible collision or other accident brings it to a stop.
Neither must I act as the world does. Just to be like those around them, to be no better and no worse, satisfies many. But to copy the customs and follow the standard of an evil world, is far below the calling of a Christian. To set examples rather than follow them, is his duty and privilege. To be a child of God "in the midst of a perverse and crooked generation," is to shine as a light in the world, is the Master's plain command.
Neither must I act merely as a good citizen, a good neighbor, a good husband, or father, or wife, or child. To be exemplary in the family relationship brings a present reward. We can only be too thankful for those who act thus. Would that there were more who endeavored to rise as high as this!
But the Christian goes further. To do all in the name of Christ is to act in everything as one of Christ's disciples. It is to live as one who bears the name of Christ, a representative here below of the great Redeemer exalted to the Father's right hand. The living Christ is there in glory. But if you are His, He dwells in your heart by His Holy Spirit, and you are to go forth into an evil world bearing His mark, guided by His Spirit, so that men may see in you, as in a mirror, something of the Saviour's grace and majesty, and glory.
It is a very high standard, and there are none but come sadly short of it. But let us set it before us. Let us remember we are called to it. Let us be content with nothing lower, and then we shall be assured that Christ is with us, and will in some measure enable us to attain as we desire. "Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus."
Here is our aim. The main thought is, that in everything, the Christian acts as a representative of Christ. But in seven particulars the idea seems to branch out, and each one may assist the Christian in holy walking.
1. Do all in the STRENGTH of Christ. From first to last, a Christian has no power in himself. He has no power to resist evil or rise higher, or to fulfill a single precept. As soon may a child two years, kill a robust lion, as a Christian in his own strength conquer sin. Perhaps a man says about some particular fault or temptation, "I have no fear on that score!" But it is not at all unlikely a few weeks after, he may have to lament his self-confidence. Or perhaps a man says, "That is not one of my weak points!" and he glories that in that direction there is no likelihood of his falling. But whether it be our weak point or our strong point, there is no security except in lowly trust in the Saviour.
Moses was meek - but he was angry with the people, and spoke unadvisedly with his lips, and so was never permitted to enter Canaan. Hezekiah had been a faithful and devoted servant of God - but when God left him to try him, he soon fell into evil. But depend continually on the grace of the Lord Jesus, and you will conquer. "Be strong in the Lord, and in the power of His might."
A working man had followed Christ for twenty years, but he found the glass of beer was getting too strong a hold of him. It was a great struggle with him what he should do; but he wisely determined, as the only safe remedy, to give it up altogether. But he found it harder work even than beginning to serve Christ at first. Friends did not understand his being so particular, and he found it rather hard crossing "the Bridge of Sneers," and getting up "Opposition Hill." One day, however, he took up an old hymn book and his eye lighted on this verse -
"Let not my heart despond and say,
How shall I stand the trying day?
He has declared by firm decree,
That as your day, your strength shall be."
The words cheered his heart and sent him on his way rejoicing, and ever since he has been thankful for the help thus afforded him. If you wise to overcome, remember the secret. It is by ever clinging to Christ Jesus. "I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me." (Philippians 4:13).
2. Do all out of LOVE to Christ. Here is to be our motive. Love makes duty light. Love makes toil and labor pleasant. Love sweetens the bitter cup, and makes self-denial easy. A spirit of grateful love, changes the character of everything we have to do. Hence nourish the sacred flame. "Let the love of Christ constrain you." Think of all He is, how infinitely worthy of the love of man and angels. Think of all that He has done for you by His life and His death. Think of His everlasting love to you, His constant intercession for you, His continual watching over you, His ever guiding your footsteps, His delivering you from dangers on the right hand and on the left, His preparing a glorious home for you in His kingdom above.
Look for the Holy Spirit to stir up within you perpetually the remembrance of His love. Come to His table that you may be the more quickened in the knowledge of His exceeding great love and tender mercy. Pray that your heart may be "hot with the love of Christ" - so shall your life praise Him,and show forth what He has done for you.
Once earthly joy I craved,
Sought peace and rest;
Now You alone I seek,
Give what is best!
This all my prayer shall be,
More love, O Christ, to Thee.
More love to Thee!
~George Everard~
(continued with # 3)
Saturday, September 29, 2018
All For Christ? # 1
All For Christ? # 1
There is an exquisite hymn of Christian experience which tells of the writer's growth in grace. It testifies of an increasing sense of Christ's preciousness. In the four verses four steps show the progress made:
"All for self - and none for Thee."
"Some for self - and some for Thee."
"Less for self - and more for Thee."
Then comes the blessed outcome;
"Higher than the highest Heaven,
Deeper than the deepest sea:
Lord, Your love at last has conquered;
Grant me now my sou's petition:
None for self - and all for Thee."
"All for Christ" is the aim every Christian should cherish in life. We can only enjoy the comfort and peace which Christ gives, in proportion as we walk as He directs. If we desire to spend a happy, useful life, if we desire to meet the trials and the cares it may bring in quiet confidence and hope - we must not only rely upon the Saviour's all-sufficient grace, but carefully obey the precepts He has given us.
Doing this, we need never be afraid. Dark clouds may overshadow our path, disease and death may visit our homes, losses and bad debts and hard times and multiplied troubles may come upon us - but doing God's will, trusting in His never-failing Providence, relying upon His free grace and mercy in Christ, we are assured that He is with us, and will never fail us.
"All for Christ" is our motto. The Apostle Paul gives it in a few striking words: "Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks unto God and the Father by Him" (Colossians 3:17).
We mark here, that true Christian principle has universal sway and operation. It has deep foundations. It rests on the solid rock of revealed truth. It takes its stand on sound doctrine, the Divine Sonship, the atonement, the resurrection, the mediatorial power and dignity of the Lord Jesus, on the renewing and regenerating grace of the Holy Spirit, as the source of all peace and consolation. But, resting here, as the ground of hope and security ... the conscience purged through the sprinkled blood, the heart changed and the will molded by the Spirit, the believer goes forward in a spirit of lively gratitude to carry into daily practice the lessons which grace has taught him.
And in the obedience to be rendered, there is no limitation. The precept is as broad as the promise. "Whatever you shall ask the Father in My Name, He will give it to you." "All things, whatever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive." Thus runs the promise. (John 16:23; Matthew 21:22). Exactly parallel runs the precept: "Whatever you do...do all in the name of the Lord Jesus;" or again, "Whether therefore you eat, or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God" (1 Cor. 10:31). On the other hand you have the "whatever" of promised good; on the other, the "whatever" of obedience commanded. You have the "all things" given in love to the believer; you have the "all things" to be performed out of gratitude according to God's will.
So we see that the precept takes in the whole field of a Christian's life and duty. It covers every inch of ground. It distinctly bears on every act and word and thought, and on every moment of our time. It permits no exceptions. From our first waking thought in the morning to the last breath we draw before we sleep at night, from the first day of January to the last day of December, and that of every year of our lives, until our course is run - all is to be yielded, gladly and willingly, to the service of our Redeemer-King.
"Business is business, work is work, religion is religion," is the thought of some who profess and call themselves Christians. Not so! Business is religion, work is religion, our common everyday duties are religion, if only they be done as the Master bids us!
"Our clergyman comes out of a hot bed," said one, "and preaches on Sunday a sermon on our duty far higher than we can reach. So I listen to what he says, and then go back to my work on Monday remembering my chief duty is to provide for my wife and my family."
There is a measure of truth in his words. I admit that the precepts of Christ are "far too high for a man of the world. To do as Christ commands must be an intolerable bondage to one who has no living faith, who knows nothing of Christ's love, nor has received the power and grace of the Holy Spirit. But it is not too high for one who is a Christian indeed. No aim can be too exalted for one who has been purchased by the blood of Christ, and who has yielded himself as a living sacrifice to the Father in Heaven. We dare not to please man, lower the standard or lessen the responsibility which is laid upon us. We dare not, and we must not, narrow the limit of our service or the extent of our obedience.
The standard which the Apostle gives, reaches to every sphere and concerns every part of life. It touches the hidden world of the heart, and claims a control over every thought and motive and purpose. It comes to the little world of the family circle, and is our guide as to all we should speak and do amidst children or others about us. It follows us into the social world of friends and acquaintances, and is to control our pleasures and recreations, the amusements we frequent, the books we read, and the company we choose.
It pursues us to the world of business, and takes note of our course of action in the shop, in the counting-house, in the market-place, or the exchange.
In a religious world we are still to be directed by the same precept. What worship we offer, what liberality we show, what labor we are willing to give - all this is taken into account by Him who searches the heart and knows all our ways.
In fact, there is no part of our life that must be exempted from Christian principle. Business and recreation, social fellowship, the use of our money and our time - all we are, all we have, all we do or say must be for Christ, if we would be true to Him. We must never mark out one acre, or one square yard, or one inch of our life, and say in our heart, "Christ has nothing to do with this." If we willfully take one single moment of our lives, or one single act, or word, or thought out of the direct control of the fear and love of God - that moment, or act, or word, or thought is one of sin.
~George Everard~
(continued with # 2)
There is an exquisite hymn of Christian experience which tells of the writer's growth in grace. It testifies of an increasing sense of Christ's preciousness. In the four verses four steps show the progress made:
"All for self - and none for Thee."
"Some for self - and some for Thee."
"Less for self - and more for Thee."
Then comes the blessed outcome;
"Higher than the highest Heaven,
Deeper than the deepest sea:
Lord, Your love at last has conquered;
Grant me now my sou's petition:
None for self - and all for Thee."
"All for Christ" is the aim every Christian should cherish in life. We can only enjoy the comfort and peace which Christ gives, in proportion as we walk as He directs. If we desire to spend a happy, useful life, if we desire to meet the trials and the cares it may bring in quiet confidence and hope - we must not only rely upon the Saviour's all-sufficient grace, but carefully obey the precepts He has given us.
Doing this, we need never be afraid. Dark clouds may overshadow our path, disease and death may visit our homes, losses and bad debts and hard times and multiplied troubles may come upon us - but doing God's will, trusting in His never-failing Providence, relying upon His free grace and mercy in Christ, we are assured that He is with us, and will never fail us.
"All for Christ" is our motto. The Apostle Paul gives it in a few striking words: "Whatever you do in word or deed, do all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks unto God and the Father by Him" (Colossians 3:17).
We mark here, that true Christian principle has universal sway and operation. It has deep foundations. It rests on the solid rock of revealed truth. It takes its stand on sound doctrine, the Divine Sonship, the atonement, the resurrection, the mediatorial power and dignity of the Lord Jesus, on the renewing and regenerating grace of the Holy Spirit, as the source of all peace and consolation. But, resting here, as the ground of hope and security ... the conscience purged through the sprinkled blood, the heart changed and the will molded by the Spirit, the believer goes forward in a spirit of lively gratitude to carry into daily practice the lessons which grace has taught him.
And in the obedience to be rendered, there is no limitation. The precept is as broad as the promise. "Whatever you shall ask the Father in My Name, He will give it to you." "All things, whatever you shall ask in prayer, believing, you shall receive." Thus runs the promise. (John 16:23; Matthew 21:22). Exactly parallel runs the precept: "Whatever you do...do all in the name of the Lord Jesus;" or again, "Whether therefore you eat, or drink, or whatever you do, do all to the glory of God" (1 Cor. 10:31). On the other hand you have the "whatever" of promised good; on the other, the "whatever" of obedience commanded. You have the "all things" given in love to the believer; you have the "all things" to be performed out of gratitude according to God's will.
So we see that the precept takes in the whole field of a Christian's life and duty. It covers every inch of ground. It distinctly bears on every act and word and thought, and on every moment of our time. It permits no exceptions. From our first waking thought in the morning to the last breath we draw before we sleep at night, from the first day of January to the last day of December, and that of every year of our lives, until our course is run - all is to be yielded, gladly and willingly, to the service of our Redeemer-King.
"Business is business, work is work, religion is religion," is the thought of some who profess and call themselves Christians. Not so! Business is religion, work is religion, our common everyday duties are religion, if only they be done as the Master bids us!
"Our clergyman comes out of a hot bed," said one, "and preaches on Sunday a sermon on our duty far higher than we can reach. So I listen to what he says, and then go back to my work on Monday remembering my chief duty is to provide for my wife and my family."
There is a measure of truth in his words. I admit that the precepts of Christ are "far too high for a man of the world. To do as Christ commands must be an intolerable bondage to one who has no living faith, who knows nothing of Christ's love, nor has received the power and grace of the Holy Spirit. But it is not too high for one who is a Christian indeed. No aim can be too exalted for one who has been purchased by the blood of Christ, and who has yielded himself as a living sacrifice to the Father in Heaven. We dare not to please man, lower the standard or lessen the responsibility which is laid upon us. We dare not, and we must not, narrow the limit of our service or the extent of our obedience.
The standard which the Apostle gives, reaches to every sphere and concerns every part of life. It touches the hidden world of the heart, and claims a control over every thought and motive and purpose. It comes to the little world of the family circle, and is our guide as to all we should speak and do amidst children or others about us. It follows us into the social world of friends and acquaintances, and is to control our pleasures and recreations, the amusements we frequent, the books we read, and the company we choose.
It pursues us to the world of business, and takes note of our course of action in the shop, in the counting-house, in the market-place, or the exchange.
In a religious world we are still to be directed by the same precept. What worship we offer, what liberality we show, what labor we are willing to give - all this is taken into account by Him who searches the heart and knows all our ways.
In fact, there is no part of our life that must be exempted from Christian principle. Business and recreation, social fellowship, the use of our money and our time - all we are, all we have, all we do or say must be for Christ, if we would be true to Him. We must never mark out one acre, or one square yard, or one inch of our life, and say in our heart, "Christ has nothing to do with this." If we willfully take one single moment of our lives, or one single act, or word, or thought out of the direct control of the fear and love of God - that moment, or act, or word, or thought is one of sin.
~George Everard~
(continued with # 2)
Jewels From Tozer
Jewels From Tozer
The Church is not a social club. We are a holy people called out of darkness to show forth the glory of almighty God.
Every ransomed man owes his salvation to the fact that during his days of sinning, God kept the door of mercy open.
I want to be in a place where I have to have God in everything I do....where God is indispensable to me.
You carry worship inside your heart.
The superior Christian lets God strip him of everything that might serve as a false refuge, a secondary trust.
Our Groom (Jesus Christ) is now our identity and nothing in our past matter anymore.
Only when we live in the name of Jesus can we truly pray in His Name.
No one can worship God in Spirit and Truth for long before the obligation to holy service becomes too strong to resist.
We go astray when we think that we can do spiritual work without spiritual power.
Christ calls us to carry the cross, churches call us to have fun in His name.
Let God elevate you above all external circumstances so that you can find His heart and worship Him.
When we are enjoying the conscious presence of God, we are fulfilling the tenets of our salvation.
How utterly terrible is the current idea that Christians can serve God at their own convenience!
True and authentic Christianity is revealed by God, not discovered or conscripted by man.
Come to the Word with a spirit of longing with devotion and humble expectation. Be determined to know God.
Prophets never retired, so I'm not retiring except to put on tires to go a little faster and farther.
Unselfish love does not exploit its object and it does not ask for anything in return!
Why do you still try to carry your cares? If you are humble and trust in God's grace, why not roll them onto Him?
There is no place to hide except in the blood of the Lamb.
Only the blood of Jesus can cleanse us, yet if we withhold ourselves from that blood, we will be unclean forever.
If the envious, the deframers, and the backbiters were taken out of the average church, there would be revival overnight.
The importance of coming into God's presence is worth overcoming all obstacles along the way.
Real faith never disappoints because it is in God, grounded on His character, promises, covenant and oath.
Let us not permit our sins to discourage us from believing, for God is the one who make all things new.
We cannot enter into the presence of God while we are rebelling against God.
When you focus on the eternal, victorious Son of God, you break the devil's heart and render him powerless!
I like Easter. But let's remember that Christ's resurrection is not truer at Easter than at any other time of the year.
If all your faith depends upon a pastor's preaching, then you are a long way from being where God wants you to be.
God does not use words carelessly, and He called the blood of the Lamb "precious."
Too often we are Christians by assumption, manipulation or instruction, rather than Christians by regeneration!
The Cross is not responsible for God's love; rather it was His love that conceived the Cross.
A world of confusion and disappointment results from trying to believe without obeying.
We Christians must look sharp that our Christianity does not simply refine our sins without removing them.
There are rare Christians whose very presence incites others to be better Christians. I want to be that rare Christian!
Our identification with Christ should be that whatever He is we also want to become.
A true Christian never hides anything because a true Christian never needs to hide anything!
Talking about the Holy Spirit is not the same as honoring Him in our worship.
God is not present in church any more than He is present in your home, factory or office.
The big problem is not whether the Bible is true. The big problem is whether it is true in you.
Faith has to have works or it flaps in a circle. And works have to have faith or the works are dead.
The inner life must overcome the flesh or the flesh will overcome and destroy the inner life.
~A. W. Tozer~
The Church is not a social club. We are a holy people called out of darkness to show forth the glory of almighty God.
Every ransomed man owes his salvation to the fact that during his days of sinning, God kept the door of mercy open.
I want to be in a place where I have to have God in everything I do....where God is indispensable to me.
You carry worship inside your heart.
The superior Christian lets God strip him of everything that might serve as a false refuge, a secondary trust.
Our Groom (Jesus Christ) is now our identity and nothing in our past matter anymore.
Only when we live in the name of Jesus can we truly pray in His Name.
No one can worship God in Spirit and Truth for long before the obligation to holy service becomes too strong to resist.
We go astray when we think that we can do spiritual work without spiritual power.
Christ calls us to carry the cross, churches call us to have fun in His name.
Let God elevate you above all external circumstances so that you can find His heart and worship Him.
When we are enjoying the conscious presence of God, we are fulfilling the tenets of our salvation.
How utterly terrible is the current idea that Christians can serve God at their own convenience!
True and authentic Christianity is revealed by God, not discovered or conscripted by man.
Come to the Word with a spirit of longing with devotion and humble expectation. Be determined to know God.
Prophets never retired, so I'm not retiring except to put on tires to go a little faster and farther.
Unselfish love does not exploit its object and it does not ask for anything in return!
Why do you still try to carry your cares? If you are humble and trust in God's grace, why not roll them onto Him?
There is no place to hide except in the blood of the Lamb.
Only the blood of Jesus can cleanse us, yet if we withhold ourselves from that blood, we will be unclean forever.
If the envious, the deframers, and the backbiters were taken out of the average church, there would be revival overnight.
The importance of coming into God's presence is worth overcoming all obstacles along the way.
Real faith never disappoints because it is in God, grounded on His character, promises, covenant and oath.
Let us not permit our sins to discourage us from believing, for God is the one who make all things new.
We cannot enter into the presence of God while we are rebelling against God.
When you focus on the eternal, victorious Son of God, you break the devil's heart and render him powerless!
I like Easter. But let's remember that Christ's resurrection is not truer at Easter than at any other time of the year.
If all your faith depends upon a pastor's preaching, then you are a long way from being where God wants you to be.
God does not use words carelessly, and He called the blood of the Lamb "precious."
Too often we are Christians by assumption, manipulation or instruction, rather than Christians by regeneration!
The Cross is not responsible for God's love; rather it was His love that conceived the Cross.
A world of confusion and disappointment results from trying to believe without obeying.
We Christians must look sharp that our Christianity does not simply refine our sins without removing them.
There are rare Christians whose very presence incites others to be better Christians. I want to be that rare Christian!
Our identification with Christ should be that whatever He is we also want to become.
A true Christian never hides anything because a true Christian never needs to hide anything!
Talking about the Holy Spirit is not the same as honoring Him in our worship.
God is not present in church any more than He is present in your home, factory or office.
The big problem is not whether the Bible is true. The big problem is whether it is true in you.
Faith has to have works or it flaps in a circle. And works have to have faith or the works are dead.
The inner life must overcome the flesh or the flesh will overcome and destroy the inner life.
~A. W. Tozer~
Saturday, September 22, 2018
Paralysis of Preoccupation
Paralysis of Preoccupation
Caesar Augustus was having trouble with his tax income. Prices were high and armies of occupation, plus soldier's need of a special bonus for danger money, kept the treasury low. Caesar needed cash!
This could be part of the trouble that furrowed the brow of Herod, vassal-king in the Roman occupied Palestine. He must channel more money to his chief.
In the midst of his quandary, some star-gazers had asked audience with Herod because their craft had revealed to them that a person of royal birth had just entered the world, and in that vicinity!
Our story says Herod "was troubled", and all Jerusalem with him." I imagine that there was a touch of fear about his message to the wise men: "When ye have found him, bring me word again, that I may come and worship him also." Half an hour on horseback and Herod could have investigated the spot where the royal child was born. But the demanding affairs of state crowded the time sheet of the ruler. He took a short while out to inquire of scribes and chief priests, but he went no further. Just half an hour's gallop away the greatest event in human history had taken place, and Herod had missed it. Had he gone and had he worshiped, his personal history and destiny might have been different.
Although Herod and all Jerusalem were troubled, there was a minority, too insignificant to mention, who were not troubled. Notice Mary and Joseph on their way to the temple with their holy child. The saintly Simeon is on duty to take the offering the poor couple bring at the dedication of Jesus. Notice the corners of Mary's mouth curve upwards as the priest says, "For mine eyes have seen thy salvation."
I think that often we overlook the first thing that Jesus ever did. Before He knew where He was, before He knew who He was, before He could walk, before He could talk - Jesus set a pattern for His life and, in measure, for eternity. He divided men!
The first thing that Jesus the Babe did was to divide the nation. Most were against Him, a few for Him. He divided men at His birth; He divided them on His blessed Cross in death; He divided them in His life in the synagogue (John 7:43). He will divide them at the judgment seat. Jesus declared quite openly that His mission was to divide men (Luke 12:51). He still divides men, and He will do so until time ends.
Dr. Tozer once reminded us that after Adam sinned, he became occupied with things. Today we are too preoccupied with the complexities of our modern "rat race." Bunyan had an old materialist who was so busy looking down at his much rake that he had no time to see the crown of dazzling splendor above his head.
Men are now so occupied with getting to the moon that they have forgotten how to get to heaven. They are so bent on inventing new ways to liquidate cities that they have lost sight of living. Some scientists spend their lives inventing death.
This troubled age so relentlessly broadcasts its groans over worldwide radios every hour on the hour that men have forgotten that there is a Prince of Peace.
Honesty is hard to come by even in the church of the living God. We believers are so preoccupied with the lesser things of the church that we have starved our own appetite for the moving of the Spirit.
As we enter this last phase of 1964, I challenge each reader, pastor, or missionary to check his record of soul-saving over the year gone by. The strong wine of statistics has blurred the thinking of many. Just who of our group did get saved this year? Just which person was filled with the Holy Spirit? Where are our ranks depleted because our members have moved off into full-time service for Christ at home or abroad?
After reading and listening to TV, we are again so preoccupied with events that the great event of His near return is clouded.
Had Christ come sweeping down the skies in the fiery chariot that Elijah went up in, the world would then have believed on Him. Had He come with ten thousands of His Old Testament saints and the blast of a million angelic trumpets, all men would then have fallen in worship.
Christ came veiled in flesh. He took the limits of any other infant. Today again He withholds His power and glory. Daily He hears millions blaspheme His holy name. He seems indifferent to the hourly breaking of His commandments and the wrecking of His sabbaths.
But wait! Who shall abide the day of His coming? Of this I am sure: Jesus Christ came to produce a better church than we have here at the moment. He said, "I am the door." He is the door by which we enter to greater power. By Him we enter into all the riches of the Godhead. By Him and through Him and for Him all things exist.
If we were not so preoccupied with lesser things, we would be grief-stricken that we have failed to inherit our possessions in Him. In failing Him, we hurt His dear heart day by day.
We are too preoccupied!
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(The End)
Caesar Augustus was having trouble with his tax income. Prices were high and armies of occupation, plus soldier's need of a special bonus for danger money, kept the treasury low. Caesar needed cash!
This could be part of the trouble that furrowed the brow of Herod, vassal-king in the Roman occupied Palestine. He must channel more money to his chief.
In the midst of his quandary, some star-gazers had asked audience with Herod because their craft had revealed to them that a person of royal birth had just entered the world, and in that vicinity!
Our story says Herod "was troubled", and all Jerusalem with him." I imagine that there was a touch of fear about his message to the wise men: "When ye have found him, bring me word again, that I may come and worship him also." Half an hour on horseback and Herod could have investigated the spot where the royal child was born. But the demanding affairs of state crowded the time sheet of the ruler. He took a short while out to inquire of scribes and chief priests, but he went no further. Just half an hour's gallop away the greatest event in human history had taken place, and Herod had missed it. Had he gone and had he worshiped, his personal history and destiny might have been different.
Although Herod and all Jerusalem were troubled, there was a minority, too insignificant to mention, who were not troubled. Notice Mary and Joseph on their way to the temple with their holy child. The saintly Simeon is on duty to take the offering the poor couple bring at the dedication of Jesus. Notice the corners of Mary's mouth curve upwards as the priest says, "For mine eyes have seen thy salvation."
I think that often we overlook the first thing that Jesus ever did. Before He knew where He was, before He knew who He was, before He could walk, before He could talk - Jesus set a pattern for His life and, in measure, for eternity. He divided men!
The first thing that Jesus the Babe did was to divide the nation. Most were against Him, a few for Him. He divided men at His birth; He divided them on His blessed Cross in death; He divided them in His life in the synagogue (John 7:43). He will divide them at the judgment seat. Jesus declared quite openly that His mission was to divide men (Luke 12:51). He still divides men, and He will do so until time ends.
Dr. Tozer once reminded us that after Adam sinned, he became occupied with things. Today we are too preoccupied with the complexities of our modern "rat race." Bunyan had an old materialist who was so busy looking down at his much rake that he had no time to see the crown of dazzling splendor above his head.
Men are now so occupied with getting to the moon that they have forgotten how to get to heaven. They are so bent on inventing new ways to liquidate cities that they have lost sight of living. Some scientists spend their lives inventing death.
This troubled age so relentlessly broadcasts its groans over worldwide radios every hour on the hour that men have forgotten that there is a Prince of Peace.
Honesty is hard to come by even in the church of the living God. We believers are so preoccupied with the lesser things of the church that we have starved our own appetite for the moving of the Spirit.
As we enter this last phase of 1964, I challenge each reader, pastor, or missionary to check his record of soul-saving over the year gone by. The strong wine of statistics has blurred the thinking of many. Just who of our group did get saved this year? Just which person was filled with the Holy Spirit? Where are our ranks depleted because our members have moved off into full-time service for Christ at home or abroad?
After reading and listening to TV, we are again so preoccupied with events that the great event of His near return is clouded.
Had Christ come sweeping down the skies in the fiery chariot that Elijah went up in, the world would then have believed on Him. Had He come with ten thousands of His Old Testament saints and the blast of a million angelic trumpets, all men would then have fallen in worship.
Christ came veiled in flesh. He took the limits of any other infant. Today again He withholds His power and glory. Daily He hears millions blaspheme His holy name. He seems indifferent to the hourly breaking of His commandments and the wrecking of His sabbaths.
But wait! Who shall abide the day of His coming? Of this I am sure: Jesus Christ came to produce a better church than we have here at the moment. He said, "I am the door." He is the door by which we enter to greater power. By Him we enter into all the riches of the Godhead. By Him and through Him and for Him all things exist.
If we were not so preoccupied with lesser things, we would be grief-stricken that we have failed to inherit our possessions in Him. In failing Him, we hurt His dear heart day by day.
We are too preoccupied!
~Leonard Ravenhill~
(The End)
Motives For A Holy and Careful Education of Children # 2
Motives For A Holy and Careful Education of Children # 2
6. Lastly, it will be a great addition to your joy, to think that God blessed your diligent instructions, and made you the instrument of all that good that is done upon your children, and of all that good that is done by them, and of all the happiness they have forever. To think that this was conveyed to them by your means, will give you a larger share in the delights of it.
Motive 6. Lastly, Consider what exceeding great need they have of the utmost help you can give them. It is not a bodily disease, an easy enemy, a tolerable misery, that we call unto you for their help; but it is against sin, and satan, and hellfire! It is against a body of sin; not one, but many; not small, but pernicious, having seized on the heart; deep-rooted sins, that are not easily plucked up. All the teaching and diligence, and watchfulness that you can use, is little enough, and may prove too little. They have obstinate vices which have possessed them; they are not quickly nor easily cast out; and the remnants and roots are apt to be still springing up again, when you thought they had been quite destroyed. Oh then what wisdom and diligence is requisite to so great and necessary a work!
And now, let me seriously speak to the hearts of those careless and ungodly parents, who neglect the holy education of their children.
Yes, and to those professors of godliness, that slobber over so great a work with a few customary formal duties and words, that are next to a total omission of it. Oh be not unmerciful to the souls that you have helped to bring into this world! Think not so basely of them, as if they were not worth your labor. Make not your children so like your beasts, as to make no provision but only for their flesh. Remember still that it is not beasts, but men, that you have begotten and brought forth. Educate them then and use them as men, for the love and obedience of their Maker. Oh pity and help the souls that you have defiled and undone! Have mercy on the souls that must perish in hell, if they be not saved in this day of salvation! Oh help them that have so many enemies to assault them! Help them that have so many temptations to pass through; and so many difficulties to overcome; and so severe a judgment to undergo! Help them speedily while your advantages continue; before sin have hardened them, and grace have forsaken them, and satan place a stronger garrison in their hearts. Help them while they are teachable, before they are grown up to despise your help; before you and they are separated asunder, and your opportunities be at an end. Do not sell them to satan! Betray them not by your ungodly negligence. The undoing of your children's souls is a work much fitter for satan, than for their parents. You can speak odiously of unfaithful, soul-betraying ministers; and do you not consider how odious a soul-betraying parent is? If God entrusted you but with earthly talents, take heed how you use them, for you must be accountable for your trust; and when He has entrusted you with souls, even your children's souls, will you betray them?
Do not see your children the slaves of satan here, and the firebrands of hell forever, if any diligence of yours may contribute to prevent it. If you had instructed them diligently, and watched over them, and corrected them, and done your part, it is like they had never come to this. Alas, what creatures will they be if you leave them to themselves! how ignorant, careless, crude, and beastly! Oh what a lamentable case have ungodly parents brought the world into! Ignorance and selfishness, devilish malignity, have covered the face of the earth as a deluge, and driven away wisdom, and self-denial, and piety, and charity, and justice, and temperance almost out of the world, confining them to a few obscure, humble souls, who love virtue, and look for their reward from God alone, and expect that by abstaining from iniquity they make themselves a prey to wolves (Isa. 59:15). Wicked education has unmanned the world, and given it to satan, and make it almost like hell. O do not join with the devil in this unnatural, horrid wickedness!
~Richard Baxter~
(The End)
6. Lastly, it will be a great addition to your joy, to think that God blessed your diligent instructions, and made you the instrument of all that good that is done upon your children, and of all that good that is done by them, and of all the happiness they have forever. To think that this was conveyed to them by your means, will give you a larger share in the delights of it.
Motive 6. Lastly, Consider what exceeding great need they have of the utmost help you can give them. It is not a bodily disease, an easy enemy, a tolerable misery, that we call unto you for their help; but it is against sin, and satan, and hellfire! It is against a body of sin; not one, but many; not small, but pernicious, having seized on the heart; deep-rooted sins, that are not easily plucked up. All the teaching and diligence, and watchfulness that you can use, is little enough, and may prove too little. They have obstinate vices which have possessed them; they are not quickly nor easily cast out; and the remnants and roots are apt to be still springing up again, when you thought they had been quite destroyed. Oh then what wisdom and diligence is requisite to so great and necessary a work!
And now, let me seriously speak to the hearts of those careless and ungodly parents, who neglect the holy education of their children.
Yes, and to those professors of godliness, that slobber over so great a work with a few customary formal duties and words, that are next to a total omission of it. Oh be not unmerciful to the souls that you have helped to bring into this world! Think not so basely of them, as if they were not worth your labor. Make not your children so like your beasts, as to make no provision but only for their flesh. Remember still that it is not beasts, but men, that you have begotten and brought forth. Educate them then and use them as men, for the love and obedience of their Maker. Oh pity and help the souls that you have defiled and undone! Have mercy on the souls that must perish in hell, if they be not saved in this day of salvation! Oh help them that have so many enemies to assault them! Help them that have so many temptations to pass through; and so many difficulties to overcome; and so severe a judgment to undergo! Help them speedily while your advantages continue; before sin have hardened them, and grace have forsaken them, and satan place a stronger garrison in their hearts. Help them while they are teachable, before they are grown up to despise your help; before you and they are separated asunder, and your opportunities be at an end. Do not sell them to satan! Betray them not by your ungodly negligence. The undoing of your children's souls is a work much fitter for satan, than for their parents. You can speak odiously of unfaithful, soul-betraying ministers; and do you not consider how odious a soul-betraying parent is? If God entrusted you but with earthly talents, take heed how you use them, for you must be accountable for your trust; and when He has entrusted you with souls, even your children's souls, will you betray them?
Do not see your children the slaves of satan here, and the firebrands of hell forever, if any diligence of yours may contribute to prevent it. If you had instructed them diligently, and watched over them, and corrected them, and done your part, it is like they had never come to this. Alas, what creatures will they be if you leave them to themselves! how ignorant, careless, crude, and beastly! Oh what a lamentable case have ungodly parents brought the world into! Ignorance and selfishness, devilish malignity, have covered the face of the earth as a deluge, and driven away wisdom, and self-denial, and piety, and charity, and justice, and temperance almost out of the world, confining them to a few obscure, humble souls, who love virtue, and look for their reward from God alone, and expect that by abstaining from iniquity they make themselves a prey to wolves (Isa. 59:15). Wicked education has unmanned the world, and given it to satan, and make it almost like hell. O do not join with the devil in this unnatural, horrid wickedness!
~Richard Baxter~
(The End)
Saturday, September 15, 2018
Total Commitment To Christ # 2
Total Commitment To Christ # 2
We used to sing, "High heaven that heard my solemn vow, that vow renewed shall daily hear." People are afraid of that kind of thing now, but I believe that just as Daniel determined that he would not eat of the king's meat and as Jesus set His face like a flint, and just as Paul said "one thing I do," the true follower of Christ must be a man whose will has been sanctified. He dare not be a will-less man. I never believed that when we teach the deeper life we should teach that God destroys our will. But God unites our will with His will and our will becomes strong in His will, and sometimes as we go on in God we hardly know whether it is our will or God's that is working at a given moment. [I agree totally! and I cannot agree more fully!]
Exclusive Attachment
Now I go on to the exclusive attachment. Our attachment to the Person of Christ must exclude all that is contrary to Christ. These are the days when we are trying to be 100 percent positive. But the Scripture says of Jesus, "You love righteousness and hate wickedness" (Psalm 45:7). That was said of the very Holy Christ Himself, who is higher than the highest heavens and separate from sinners. If He had to hate in order to love, so do you and I. To be 100 percent positive would be as fatal as to inhale steadily all your life without exhaling. You can't do that!
The human body requires that you inhale to get oxygen and exhale to get rid of the poison. And so the Church of Christ has to inhale and exhale. When she inhales she must exhale. When the Church inhales the Holy Spirit she must exhale everything that is contrary to Him!
I don't believe any man can love until he's able to hate. I don't think any man can love God unless he hates the devil. I don't think he can love righteousness unless he hates sin; for the Scripture leaves us with the belief that in order to accept there are some things you must reject. In order to affirm there are things you have to deny; in order to say yes you have to be able to say no.
For my part I have long ago come to the conclusion that I can't get along with everybody. In an effort to please everybody you will succeed in pleasing nobody! I don't want a watered-down Christianity. I want to be able to say no. I say no to the devil and no to the Pope and no to everybody who has anything to say that's contrary to the Lord. I adore Him and I am attached to Him. With an intellectual attachment that is theological and with a volitional attachment that is final and with an exclusive attachment that would exclude everything that's contrary to Christ.
Inclusive Attachment
Then there is the inclusive attachment. What do I mean by that? Well, that's the inhaling, you see. All that Christ is and does and says and promises and commands, and all the glories that circle around His head and all the offices He holds and all the shining beauties and varied facets of His infinite nature, all that He is and all that He has said and all that He has promised - I take all that, I include all that. In addition, since I'm identified with Him, I accept His friends as my friends. I love all the people of God and preach to them all - and some of them listen!
You know, the Lord has some old friends, really. That fellow that goes down the street with a "Jesus Only" button or a "Jesus Saves" button as big as a dinner plate, and his hair not combed too well, staring ahead - if he belongs to Jesus I'm going to own him. An old bishop once said the Lord had His treasure in earthen vessels and some of the vessels are a bit cracked! You've got to be willing to own the friends of the Lord wherever they are. His friends are my friends and His enemies are my enemies. This "togetherness" that everybody is talking about - I don't like it. I want to know what you stand for. Whom do you love and what do you hate?
A good definition of a Christian is somebody who is back from the dead. I think that Paul was one of the oddest and strangest and one of the most glorious of all the Christians that have ever lived, and he gave us a little text that no contemporary editor would ever accept in a manuscript without recasting it. "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live..." Now how did he get that way? "I am crucified with Christ." He's dead. "Nevertheless I live." He's alive. Is he alive or is he dead? "And the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me" (Gal. 2:20). See Paul contradicting himself there. And yet within all this contradiction there is the synthesis of a marvelous and glorious truth; that a Christian is one who was crucified and is alive, being joined to Jesus Christ as He joined humanity to the deity in the hypostatic union forever - the eternal God joined to the nature of man, never to be reversed.
All the members of the Body of Christ joined to His body share in some measure in that hypostatic union, so that we are united with Him. When He died on the Cross we died on the Cross, and when He rose from the dead we rose from the dead, and when He went to the right hand of God, we went with Him. "Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God" (Col. 3:1). And it is written that we are "seated...in the heavenly realms" (Eph. 2:6), which means we are with Him where He is, members of His great mystical body. How wonderful!
Irrevocable Attachment
Then there is the irrevocable attachment. What do I mean by that? I mean that the Lord doesn't want any experimenters about. Some movie actor wrote a book one time called "Try Jesus." I never read the book. I wouldn't be caught dead reading it. "Try Jesus." All this experimentation - I don't believe in it. I believe we ought to be suicide bombers. We ought to tie ourselves in the cockpit and drive on the deck and if we go out, we go out. Sink or swim, live or die, irrevocably attached in love and faith and devotion to Jesus Christ the Lord. Christians ought to those who are so totally committed that it is final. This weak looking back over your shoulder to see if there isn't something better - I can't stand it. One time a young man came to an old saint who taught the deeper life, the crucified life, and said to him, "Father, what does it mean to be crucified?" The old man thought for a moment and said, "Well, to be crucified means three things. First, the man who is crucified is facing only one direction." I like that - facing only one direction. If he hears anything behind him he can't turn around to see what's going on. He has stopped looking back. The crucified man on the Cross is looking in only one direction and that is the direction of God and Christ and the Holy Spirit and the direction of the edifying of the church, the direction of sanctification and the direction of the Spirit-filled life.
And the old man scratched his scraggly gray hair and said, "One thing more, son, about a man on a Cross - he's not going back." The fellow going out to die on the Cross doesn't say to his wife, "Goodbye, honey. I'll be back shortly after five." When you go out to die on the Cross you bid goodbye - you're not going back! If we would preach more of this and stop trying to make the Christian life so easy it's contemptible, we would have more converts that would last. Get a man converted who knows that if he joins Jesus Christ he's finished, and that while he's going to come up and live anew, as far as this world's concerned he's not going back - then you have a real Christian indeed!
The old man went on, "Another thing about the man on the Cross, son; he has no further plans of his own." I like that, too! Somebody else made his plans for him, and when they nailed him up there all his plans disappeared. On the way up to the hill he didn't see a friend and say, "Well, Henry, next Saturday about three I'll come by and we'll go fishing up on the lake." He was going out to die and he had no plans at all! Oh, what busy-beaver Christians we are with all of our plans, and some of them, even though they are done in the name of the Lord and evangelical Christianity, are as carnal as goats!! It is beautiful to say "I am crucified with Christ" and know that Christ is making your plans. I tell you, ladies and gentlemen, twenty minutes on your knees in silence before God will sometimes teach you more than you can learn out of books and teach you more than you can ever learn in churches. And the Lord will give you your plans and lay them before you!
If the boards of the churches would only learn to spend more time with God and less time debating, they could save all those midnight meetings where everybody leans back weary from discussing things. I tell you, you can cut down your time in debating and discussing if you spend more time waiting on God. He'll give you the Holy Spirit and He'll give you and teach you HIS plans!
Now I think that's all I want to say. We are to be joined to Jesus Christ, intelligently joined by knowing who He is; we are to be volitionally joined and not to try to live on our feelings, though thank God there'll be a lot of feeling going on with it! And we are to be exclusively attached, excluding everything that's contrary to Him; and inclusively attached, taking in every thing that He surrounds Himself with; and irrevocably attached so we are expendable and are not going back!
~A. W. Tozer~
(The End)
[Tozer, just like his Master, doesn't fit neatly into our theological boxes. He was a man after God's own heart and was willing to break the rules (man-made ones that is) to get there.
The above writing by Tozer that touches on the heart of this goal. It was given by Tozer shortly before his passing and transcribed shortly thereafter.
This is meat to sink your spiritual teeth into. Tozer's writings will show you the way to satisfy your spiritual hunger.
The text above, "Total Commitment to Christ" is in the public domain.]
We used to sing, "High heaven that heard my solemn vow, that vow renewed shall daily hear." People are afraid of that kind of thing now, but I believe that just as Daniel determined that he would not eat of the king's meat and as Jesus set His face like a flint, and just as Paul said "one thing I do," the true follower of Christ must be a man whose will has been sanctified. He dare not be a will-less man. I never believed that when we teach the deeper life we should teach that God destroys our will. But God unites our will with His will and our will becomes strong in His will, and sometimes as we go on in God we hardly know whether it is our will or God's that is working at a given moment. [I agree totally! and I cannot agree more fully!]
Exclusive Attachment
Now I go on to the exclusive attachment. Our attachment to the Person of Christ must exclude all that is contrary to Christ. These are the days when we are trying to be 100 percent positive. But the Scripture says of Jesus, "You love righteousness and hate wickedness" (Psalm 45:7). That was said of the very Holy Christ Himself, who is higher than the highest heavens and separate from sinners. If He had to hate in order to love, so do you and I. To be 100 percent positive would be as fatal as to inhale steadily all your life without exhaling. You can't do that!
The human body requires that you inhale to get oxygen and exhale to get rid of the poison. And so the Church of Christ has to inhale and exhale. When she inhales she must exhale. When the Church inhales the Holy Spirit she must exhale everything that is contrary to Him!
I don't believe any man can love until he's able to hate. I don't think any man can love God unless he hates the devil. I don't think he can love righteousness unless he hates sin; for the Scripture leaves us with the belief that in order to accept there are some things you must reject. In order to affirm there are things you have to deny; in order to say yes you have to be able to say no.
For my part I have long ago come to the conclusion that I can't get along with everybody. In an effort to please everybody you will succeed in pleasing nobody! I don't want a watered-down Christianity. I want to be able to say no. I say no to the devil and no to the Pope and no to everybody who has anything to say that's contrary to the Lord. I adore Him and I am attached to Him. With an intellectual attachment that is theological and with a volitional attachment that is final and with an exclusive attachment that would exclude everything that's contrary to Christ.
Inclusive Attachment
Then there is the inclusive attachment. What do I mean by that? Well, that's the inhaling, you see. All that Christ is and does and says and promises and commands, and all the glories that circle around His head and all the offices He holds and all the shining beauties and varied facets of His infinite nature, all that He is and all that He has said and all that He has promised - I take all that, I include all that. In addition, since I'm identified with Him, I accept His friends as my friends. I love all the people of God and preach to them all - and some of them listen!
You know, the Lord has some old friends, really. That fellow that goes down the street with a "Jesus Only" button or a "Jesus Saves" button as big as a dinner plate, and his hair not combed too well, staring ahead - if he belongs to Jesus I'm going to own him. An old bishop once said the Lord had His treasure in earthen vessels and some of the vessels are a bit cracked! You've got to be willing to own the friends of the Lord wherever they are. His friends are my friends and His enemies are my enemies. This "togetherness" that everybody is talking about - I don't like it. I want to know what you stand for. Whom do you love and what do you hate?
A good definition of a Christian is somebody who is back from the dead. I think that Paul was one of the oddest and strangest and one of the most glorious of all the Christians that have ever lived, and he gave us a little text that no contemporary editor would ever accept in a manuscript without recasting it. "I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live..." Now how did he get that way? "I am crucified with Christ." He's dead. "Nevertheless I live." He's alive. Is he alive or is he dead? "And the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me" (Gal. 2:20). See Paul contradicting himself there. And yet within all this contradiction there is the synthesis of a marvelous and glorious truth; that a Christian is one who was crucified and is alive, being joined to Jesus Christ as He joined humanity to the deity in the hypostatic union forever - the eternal God joined to the nature of man, never to be reversed.
All the members of the Body of Christ joined to His body share in some measure in that hypostatic union, so that we are united with Him. When He died on the Cross we died on the Cross, and when He rose from the dead we rose from the dead, and when He went to the right hand of God, we went with Him. "Since, then, you have been raised with Christ, set your hearts on things above where Christ is seated at the right hand of God" (Col. 3:1). And it is written that we are "seated...in the heavenly realms" (Eph. 2:6), which means we are with Him where He is, members of His great mystical body. How wonderful!
Irrevocable Attachment
Then there is the irrevocable attachment. What do I mean by that? I mean that the Lord doesn't want any experimenters about. Some movie actor wrote a book one time called "Try Jesus." I never read the book. I wouldn't be caught dead reading it. "Try Jesus." All this experimentation - I don't believe in it. I believe we ought to be suicide bombers. We ought to tie ourselves in the cockpit and drive on the deck and if we go out, we go out. Sink or swim, live or die, irrevocably attached in love and faith and devotion to Jesus Christ the Lord. Christians ought to those who are so totally committed that it is final. This weak looking back over your shoulder to see if there isn't something better - I can't stand it. One time a young man came to an old saint who taught the deeper life, the crucified life, and said to him, "Father, what does it mean to be crucified?" The old man thought for a moment and said, "Well, to be crucified means three things. First, the man who is crucified is facing only one direction." I like that - facing only one direction. If he hears anything behind him he can't turn around to see what's going on. He has stopped looking back. The crucified man on the Cross is looking in only one direction and that is the direction of God and Christ and the Holy Spirit and the direction of the edifying of the church, the direction of sanctification and the direction of the Spirit-filled life.
And the old man scratched his scraggly gray hair and said, "One thing more, son, about a man on a Cross - he's not going back." The fellow going out to die on the Cross doesn't say to his wife, "Goodbye, honey. I'll be back shortly after five." When you go out to die on the Cross you bid goodbye - you're not going back! If we would preach more of this and stop trying to make the Christian life so easy it's contemptible, we would have more converts that would last. Get a man converted who knows that if he joins Jesus Christ he's finished, and that while he's going to come up and live anew, as far as this world's concerned he's not going back - then you have a real Christian indeed!
The old man went on, "Another thing about the man on the Cross, son; he has no further plans of his own." I like that, too! Somebody else made his plans for him, and when they nailed him up there all his plans disappeared. On the way up to the hill he didn't see a friend and say, "Well, Henry, next Saturday about three I'll come by and we'll go fishing up on the lake." He was going out to die and he had no plans at all! Oh, what busy-beaver Christians we are with all of our plans, and some of them, even though they are done in the name of the Lord and evangelical Christianity, are as carnal as goats!! It is beautiful to say "I am crucified with Christ" and know that Christ is making your plans. I tell you, ladies and gentlemen, twenty minutes on your knees in silence before God will sometimes teach you more than you can learn out of books and teach you more than you can ever learn in churches. And the Lord will give you your plans and lay them before you!
If the boards of the churches would only learn to spend more time with God and less time debating, they could save all those midnight meetings where everybody leans back weary from discussing things. I tell you, you can cut down your time in debating and discussing if you spend more time waiting on God. He'll give you the Holy Spirit and He'll give you and teach you HIS plans!
Now I think that's all I want to say. We are to be joined to Jesus Christ, intelligently joined by knowing who He is; we are to be volitionally joined and not to try to live on our feelings, though thank God there'll be a lot of feeling going on with it! And we are to be exclusively attached, excluding everything that's contrary to Him; and inclusively attached, taking in every thing that He surrounds Himself with; and irrevocably attached so we are expendable and are not going back!
~A. W. Tozer~
(The End)
[Tozer, just like his Master, doesn't fit neatly into our theological boxes. He was a man after God's own heart and was willing to break the rules (man-made ones that is) to get there.
The above writing by Tozer that touches on the heart of this goal. It was given by Tozer shortly before his passing and transcribed shortly thereafter.
This is meat to sink your spiritual teeth into. Tozer's writings will show you the way to satisfy your spiritual hunger.
The text above, "Total Commitment to Christ" is in the public domain.]
Total Commitment To Christ # 1
Total Commitment To Christ # 1
In the first chapter of Colossians we read that Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created; things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the church; He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything He might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all His fullness in Him" (Col. 1:15-19).
Then in Ephesians, the first chapter, Paul says that God's power was exerted in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under His feet, and appointed Him to be head over everything for the Church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills everything in every way. (1:20-23).
Now before we talk about our union with Christ and our conscious and volitional attachment to Christ in total commitment, we must look at who Christ is and what His relation is to the redeemed company we call the Church. In the passage I have quoted, you will find this truth set forth, which I may imperfectly condense into three words: centrality, basicality, preeminence.
Within the Church, Jesus Christ the Lord is central. The old writers used to say that Christ is to the Church what the soul is to the body - it is that which gives it life. Once the soul flees the body there is nothing that can keep the body alive. When the soul is gone the embalmer takes over. In the Church of Christ - any church anywhere, of any denomination - as long as Christ is there imparting life, being the life of that redeemed company, you have a Church; for Christ is central in His Church. He holds it together.
Then there is the next word, basicality. Jesus Christ is basic to the Church. He's underneath it - the whole redeemed company rests down upon the Lord Jesus Christ. I know this sounds like a string of religious cliches, but I'd like to say it at least in such a tone of voice that the cliche element will go out of it and you will hear it as though you are hearing it for the first time: The whole Church of God rests down upon the shoulders of His Son. I think we might be able to go around the world and simply cry "Christ is enough!" Jesus Christ is enough.
There is a weakness among us in evangelical circles - we put a plus sign after Christ: Christ plus something else. It is always the pluses that ruin our spiritual lives personally, and it is always the additions that weaken the Church. God has declared that Christ, His Son, is sufficient. He is the way, the truth and the life. He is wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. He is the wisdom of God and the power of God and He gathers up in Himself all things and in Him all things consist. So we do not want Jesus Christ plus something else.
"Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth! For the LORD has spoken" (Isaiah 1:2). And what He has said is, "This is My Son, whom I love. Listen to Him!" (Mark 9:7). So the Lord Jesus Christ is enough. We of the evangelical faith should not preach Christ plus science, or Christ plus philosophy, or Christ plus psychology, or Christ plus education, or Christ plus civilization, but Christ alone and Christ enough. These other things may have their place and fit in and be used. But we are not leaning on any of them; we are resting down on Him who is basic to the faith of our fathers.
Then there is the word preeminent. Christ is preeminent. He is above all things and underneath all things and outside of all things and inside of all things. As the old bishop said, "he is above all things but not pushed up, and He is beneath all, upholding; and outside all, embracing and inside of all, filling."
Now our relation to Him is all that really matters. A true Christian faith is an attachment to the Person of Christ. The attachment of the individual person to Jesus Christ is intellectual and volitional and exclusive and irrevocable.
Intellectual Attachment
To follow Christ in complete and total commitment means that there must be an intellectual attachment to Christ. That is, we cannot run on our feelings or on wisps of poetic notions about Christ. There are a great many bogus Christs among us these days, and we must show them for what they are and then point to the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world. John Owen, the old Puritan, warned people in his day: "You have an imaginary Christ, and if you are satisfied with an imaginary Christ you must be satisfied with imaginary salvation." In finality there is only one Christ, and the truly saved man has an attachment to Christ that is intellectual in that he knows who Christ is theologically. For you know there is the romantic Christ of the romance novelist and there is the sentimental Christ of the half-converted cowboy and there is the philosophical Christ of the academic egghead and there is the cozy Christ of the effeminate poet and there is the muscular Christ of the all-American halfback. But there is only one true Christ, and God has said that He is His Son.
I like what they say of Him in the creeds - that He is God of the substance of His Father, begotten before all ages; Man of the substance of His mother, born in the world; perfect God and perfect Man of a reasonable soul and human flesh subsisting, equal to His Father as touching His Godhead, less than His Father as touching His manhood; who although He be God and Man, yet He is not two, but one Christ; for us the reasonable soul and flesh are one man, so God and Man are one Christ. This is the Christ we adore, and we must have the Christ of Christian theology and we must have an intellectual attachment to Christ. We must believe in the Christ of God, that He is what God says He is.
Volitional Attachment
There is also the volitional attachment to Christ. If I am going to follow Christ in complete and total commitment I must do it by a continuous act of my will. Christians who try to live on impulse and inspiration, who hope to sail to heaven over the undulating sea of religious sea of feeling, are making a bad mistake. Christians who live on their feelings are not living very well and are not going to last very long. The old writers used to tell us of the dark night of the soul. There's a place where a Christian goes through darkness, where there is heaviness. God isn't going to take us off to heaven all wrapped in cellophane, looking as if we ought to be hanging on a Christmas tree. God is going to take us there after He has purged us and disciplined us and dragged us through the fire and has made us strong and taught us that faith and feeling are not the same - although faith, thank God, brings feeling sometimes.
~A. W. Tozer~
(continued with # 2)
In the first chapter of Colossians we read that Jesus Christ is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation. For by Him all things were created; things in heaven and on earth, visible and invisible, whether thrones or powers or rulers or authorities; all things were created by Him and for Him. He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together. And He is the head of the body, the church; He is the beginning and the firstborn from among the dead, so that in everything He might have the supremacy. For God was pleased to have all His fullness in Him" (Col. 1:15-19).
Then in Ephesians, the first chapter, Paul says that God's power was exerted in Christ when He raised Him from the dead and seated Him at His right hand in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion, and every title that can be given, not only in the present age but also in the one to come. And God placed all things under His feet, and appointed Him to be head over everything for the Church, which is His body, the fullness of Him who fills everything in every way. (1:20-23).
Now before we talk about our union with Christ and our conscious and volitional attachment to Christ in total commitment, we must look at who Christ is and what His relation is to the redeemed company we call the Church. In the passage I have quoted, you will find this truth set forth, which I may imperfectly condense into three words: centrality, basicality, preeminence.
Within the Church, Jesus Christ the Lord is central. The old writers used to say that Christ is to the Church what the soul is to the body - it is that which gives it life. Once the soul flees the body there is nothing that can keep the body alive. When the soul is gone the embalmer takes over. In the Church of Christ - any church anywhere, of any denomination - as long as Christ is there imparting life, being the life of that redeemed company, you have a Church; for Christ is central in His Church. He holds it together.
Then there is the next word, basicality. Jesus Christ is basic to the Church. He's underneath it - the whole redeemed company rests down upon the Lord Jesus Christ. I know this sounds like a string of religious cliches, but I'd like to say it at least in such a tone of voice that the cliche element will go out of it and you will hear it as though you are hearing it for the first time: The whole Church of God rests down upon the shoulders of His Son. I think we might be able to go around the world and simply cry "Christ is enough!" Jesus Christ is enough.
There is a weakness among us in evangelical circles - we put a plus sign after Christ: Christ plus something else. It is always the pluses that ruin our spiritual lives personally, and it is always the additions that weaken the Church. God has declared that Christ, His Son, is sufficient. He is the way, the truth and the life. He is wisdom and righteousness and sanctification and redemption. He is the wisdom of God and the power of God and He gathers up in Himself all things and in Him all things consist. So we do not want Jesus Christ plus something else.
"Hear, O heavens! Listen, O earth! For the LORD has spoken" (Isaiah 1:2). And what He has said is, "This is My Son, whom I love. Listen to Him!" (Mark 9:7). So the Lord Jesus Christ is enough. We of the evangelical faith should not preach Christ plus science, or Christ plus philosophy, or Christ plus psychology, or Christ plus education, or Christ plus civilization, but Christ alone and Christ enough. These other things may have their place and fit in and be used. But we are not leaning on any of them; we are resting down on Him who is basic to the faith of our fathers.
Then there is the word preeminent. Christ is preeminent. He is above all things and underneath all things and outside of all things and inside of all things. As the old bishop said, "he is above all things but not pushed up, and He is beneath all, upholding; and outside all, embracing and inside of all, filling."
Now our relation to Him is all that really matters. A true Christian faith is an attachment to the Person of Christ. The attachment of the individual person to Jesus Christ is intellectual and volitional and exclusive and irrevocable.
Intellectual Attachment
To follow Christ in complete and total commitment means that there must be an intellectual attachment to Christ. That is, we cannot run on our feelings or on wisps of poetic notions about Christ. There are a great many bogus Christs among us these days, and we must show them for what they are and then point to the Lamb of God that taketh away the sins of the world. John Owen, the old Puritan, warned people in his day: "You have an imaginary Christ, and if you are satisfied with an imaginary Christ you must be satisfied with imaginary salvation." In finality there is only one Christ, and the truly saved man has an attachment to Christ that is intellectual in that he knows who Christ is theologically. For you know there is the romantic Christ of the romance novelist and there is the sentimental Christ of the half-converted cowboy and there is the philosophical Christ of the academic egghead and there is the cozy Christ of the effeminate poet and there is the muscular Christ of the all-American halfback. But there is only one true Christ, and God has said that He is His Son.
I like what they say of Him in the creeds - that He is God of the substance of His Father, begotten before all ages; Man of the substance of His mother, born in the world; perfect God and perfect Man of a reasonable soul and human flesh subsisting, equal to His Father as touching His Godhead, less than His Father as touching His manhood; who although He be God and Man, yet He is not two, but one Christ; for us the reasonable soul and flesh are one man, so God and Man are one Christ. This is the Christ we adore, and we must have the Christ of Christian theology and we must have an intellectual attachment to Christ. We must believe in the Christ of God, that He is what God says He is.
Volitional Attachment
There is also the volitional attachment to Christ. If I am going to follow Christ in complete and total commitment I must do it by a continuous act of my will. Christians who try to live on impulse and inspiration, who hope to sail to heaven over the undulating sea of religious sea of feeling, are making a bad mistake. Christians who live on their feelings are not living very well and are not going to last very long. The old writers used to tell us of the dark night of the soul. There's a place where a Christian goes through darkness, where there is heaviness. God isn't going to take us off to heaven all wrapped in cellophane, looking as if we ought to be hanging on a Christmas tree. God is going to take us there after He has purged us and disciplined us and dragged us through the fire and has made us strong and taught us that faith and feeling are not the same - although faith, thank God, brings feeling sometimes.
~A. W. Tozer~
(continued with # 2)
Motives For A Holy and Careful Education Of Children # 1
Motives For A Holy and Careful Education Of Children # 1
"Bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord" (Ephesians 6:4).
"Do not withhold correction from a child, for if you beat him with the rod, he will not die. You shall beat him with the rod, and shall deliver his soul from hell" (Proverbs 23:13-14).
Because the chief part of family care and government consists in the right education of children, I shall adjoin here some more special motives to quicken considerate parents to this duty.
Motive 1. Consider how deeply nature itself does engage you to the greatest care and diligence for the holy education of your children. They are, as it were, parts of yourselves, and those whom nature teaches you to love and provide for, and take most care for, next to yourselves; and will you be regardless of their chief concernments? and neglective of their souls? Will you no other way show your love to your children, than every beast or bird will do their young, to cherish them until they can go abroad and shift for themselves, for bodily sustenance? It is not dogs or beasts that you bring into the world, but children that have immortal souls; and therefore it is a care and education suitable to their natures which you owe them; even such as conduces most effectually to the happiness of their souls. Nature teaches them some natural things without you, as it does the bird to fly; but it has committed it to your trust and care to teach them the greatest and most necessary things: and leave all the rest to nature, then they would not learn to speak; and if nature itself would condemn you, if you teach them not to speak, it will much more condemn you, if you teach them not to understand both what they ought to speak or do.
They have an everlasting inheritance of happiness to attain; and it is that which you must bring them up for. They have an endless misery to escape; and it is that which you must diligently teach them. If you teach them not to escape the flames of hell, what thanks do they owe you for teaching them to speak and go? If you teach them not the way to heaven, and how they may make sure of their salvation, what thanks do they owe you for teaching them how to get their livings a little while in a miserable world? If you don't teach them to know God, and how to serve Him, and be saved - you teach them nothing, or worse than nothing. It is in your hands to do them the greatest kindness or cruelty in all the world! Help them to know God and to be saved, and you do more for them than if you helped them to be kings or princes. If you neglect their souls, and if you have them in ignorance, worldliness, ungodliness, and sin, you betray them to the devil, the enemy of souls, even as truly as if you sold them to him! You sell them to be slaves to satan! You betray them to him who will deceive them and abuse them in this life, and torment them in the next.
So if you intend to train up your children in ungodliness, as if they had no God nor souls to mind, you may as well say, you intend to have them damned. And were not an enemy, yes, is not the devil more excusable, for dealing thus cruelly by your children, than you who are their parents, that are bound by nature to love them, and prevent their misery? It is odious in ministers that take the charge of souls, to betray them by their negligence, and be guilty of their everlasting misery; but in parents it is more unnuatural, and therefore more inexcusable.
Motive 2. Consider that God is the Lord and Owner of your children, both by the title of creation and redemption. Therefore in justice you must resign them to Him, and educate them for Him. Otherwise you rob God of His own creatures, and rob Christ of those for whom He died, and this to give them to the devil, the enemy of God and them. It was not the world, the flesh, or the devil that created them, or redeemed them, but God; and it is not possible for any right to be built upon a fuller title, than to make them of nothing, and redeem them from a state far worse than nothing. And after all this, shall the very parents of such children steal them from their absolute Lord and Father, and sell them to slavery and torment?
Motive 3. Consider how great power the education of children has upon all their following lives. Excepting nature and grace, there is nothing that usually does prevail so much with them - as the education they receive from their parents. Indeed the obstinacy of natural viciousness does often frustrate a good education; but if any means be likely to do good, it is this; but bad education is more constantly successful, to make them evil. This cherishes those seeds of wickedness which spring up when they come to age; this makes so many to be proud, and idle, and flesh-pleasers, and licentious, and lustful, and covetous, and all that is evil. And he has a hard task that comes after to root out these vices, which an ungodly education has so deeply impressed. Ungodly parents do serve the devil so effectually in the first impressions on their children's minds, that it is more than magistrates and ministers and all reforming means can afterwards do to recover them from that sin to God. "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." (Prov. 22:6). And so the opinions which they first receive, and the customs and habits which they learn at first, are very hardly changed afterward. I doubt not to affirm, that a godly education is God's first and ordinary appointed means, for the begetting of actual faith, and other graces, in the children of believers.
Motive 4. Consider also how many and great are your advantages above all others for your children's good.
1. Nothing is learned so well - as that which is known to come from love. The greater love is discerned in your instruction, the greater success may you expect. Now your children are more confident of their parents' love, than of any others; whether ministers and strangers speak to them in love, they cannot tell; but of their parents' love they make no doubt.
2. And their love to you is as great a preparative to your success. We all harken to those who we dearly love, with greater attention and willingness than to others.
3. You have them in hand early and often, before they have received any false opinions or bad impressions; you have them while they are most teachable, and flexible and tender.
Motive 5. Consider how great a comfort it would be to you, to have your children such as you may confidently hope are the children of God, being brought to know Him, and love, and serve Him through your own endeavors in a pious education of them.
1. When once your children are made the children of God, by the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, you may be much more free from care and trouble for them than before. Now you may boldly trust them on the care of their heavenly Father, who is able to do more for them than you can desire. He loves them better than you can love them; he is bound by promise to protect them, and provide for them, and to see that all things work together for their good.
2. Religion will teach your children to be more dutiful to yourselves, than nature can teach them. It will teach them to love you, as well as if you had the wealth of all the world. It will teach them to honor you, though you are poor and contemptible in the eyes of others.
3. And is it not an exceeding joy to think of the everlasting happiness of your child? and that you may live together in heaven forever?
~Richard Baxter~
(continued with # 2)
"Bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord" (Ephesians 6:4).
"Do not withhold correction from a child, for if you beat him with the rod, he will not die. You shall beat him with the rod, and shall deliver his soul from hell" (Proverbs 23:13-14).
Because the chief part of family care and government consists in the right education of children, I shall adjoin here some more special motives to quicken considerate parents to this duty.
Motive 1. Consider how deeply nature itself does engage you to the greatest care and diligence for the holy education of your children. They are, as it were, parts of yourselves, and those whom nature teaches you to love and provide for, and take most care for, next to yourselves; and will you be regardless of their chief concernments? and neglective of their souls? Will you no other way show your love to your children, than every beast or bird will do their young, to cherish them until they can go abroad and shift for themselves, for bodily sustenance? It is not dogs or beasts that you bring into the world, but children that have immortal souls; and therefore it is a care and education suitable to their natures which you owe them; even such as conduces most effectually to the happiness of their souls. Nature teaches them some natural things without you, as it does the bird to fly; but it has committed it to your trust and care to teach them the greatest and most necessary things: and leave all the rest to nature, then they would not learn to speak; and if nature itself would condemn you, if you teach them not to speak, it will much more condemn you, if you teach them not to understand both what they ought to speak or do.
They have an everlasting inheritance of happiness to attain; and it is that which you must bring them up for. They have an endless misery to escape; and it is that which you must diligently teach them. If you teach them not to escape the flames of hell, what thanks do they owe you for teaching them to speak and go? If you teach them not the way to heaven, and how they may make sure of their salvation, what thanks do they owe you for teaching them how to get their livings a little while in a miserable world? If you don't teach them to know God, and how to serve Him, and be saved - you teach them nothing, or worse than nothing. It is in your hands to do them the greatest kindness or cruelty in all the world! Help them to know God and to be saved, and you do more for them than if you helped them to be kings or princes. If you neglect their souls, and if you have them in ignorance, worldliness, ungodliness, and sin, you betray them to the devil, the enemy of souls, even as truly as if you sold them to him! You sell them to be slaves to satan! You betray them to him who will deceive them and abuse them in this life, and torment them in the next.
So if you intend to train up your children in ungodliness, as if they had no God nor souls to mind, you may as well say, you intend to have them damned. And were not an enemy, yes, is not the devil more excusable, for dealing thus cruelly by your children, than you who are their parents, that are bound by nature to love them, and prevent their misery? It is odious in ministers that take the charge of souls, to betray them by their negligence, and be guilty of their everlasting misery; but in parents it is more unnuatural, and therefore more inexcusable.
Motive 2. Consider that God is the Lord and Owner of your children, both by the title of creation and redemption. Therefore in justice you must resign them to Him, and educate them for Him. Otherwise you rob God of His own creatures, and rob Christ of those for whom He died, and this to give them to the devil, the enemy of God and them. It was not the world, the flesh, or the devil that created them, or redeemed them, but God; and it is not possible for any right to be built upon a fuller title, than to make them of nothing, and redeem them from a state far worse than nothing. And after all this, shall the very parents of such children steal them from their absolute Lord and Father, and sell them to slavery and torment?
Motive 3. Consider how great power the education of children has upon all their following lives. Excepting nature and grace, there is nothing that usually does prevail so much with them - as the education they receive from their parents. Indeed the obstinacy of natural viciousness does often frustrate a good education; but if any means be likely to do good, it is this; but bad education is more constantly successful, to make them evil. This cherishes those seeds of wickedness which spring up when they come to age; this makes so many to be proud, and idle, and flesh-pleasers, and licentious, and lustful, and covetous, and all that is evil. And he has a hard task that comes after to root out these vices, which an ungodly education has so deeply impressed. Ungodly parents do serve the devil so effectually in the first impressions on their children's minds, that it is more than magistrates and ministers and all reforming means can afterwards do to recover them from that sin to God. "Train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." (Prov. 22:6). And so the opinions which they first receive, and the customs and habits which they learn at first, are very hardly changed afterward. I doubt not to affirm, that a godly education is God's first and ordinary appointed means, for the begetting of actual faith, and other graces, in the children of believers.
Motive 4. Consider also how many and great are your advantages above all others for your children's good.
1. Nothing is learned so well - as that which is known to come from love. The greater love is discerned in your instruction, the greater success may you expect. Now your children are more confident of their parents' love, than of any others; whether ministers and strangers speak to them in love, they cannot tell; but of their parents' love they make no doubt.
2. And their love to you is as great a preparative to your success. We all harken to those who we dearly love, with greater attention and willingness than to others.
3. You have them in hand early and often, before they have received any false opinions or bad impressions; you have them while they are most teachable, and flexible and tender.
Motive 5. Consider how great a comfort it would be to you, to have your children such as you may confidently hope are the children of God, being brought to know Him, and love, and serve Him through your own endeavors in a pious education of them.
1. When once your children are made the children of God, by the regeneration of the Holy Spirit, you may be much more free from care and trouble for them than before. Now you may boldly trust them on the care of their heavenly Father, who is able to do more for them than you can desire. He loves them better than you can love them; he is bound by promise to protect them, and provide for them, and to see that all things work together for their good.
2. Religion will teach your children to be more dutiful to yourselves, than nature can teach them. It will teach them to love you, as well as if you had the wealth of all the world. It will teach them to honor you, though you are poor and contemptible in the eyes of others.
3. And is it not an exceeding joy to think of the everlasting happiness of your child? and that you may live together in heaven forever?
~Richard Baxter~
(continued with # 2)
Saturday, September 8, 2018
All That Man Can Need - And All That God Can Give (and others)
All That Man Can Need - And All That God Can Give (and others)
"God was pleased to have all His fullness dwell in Him" (Colossians 1:19).
"In Him all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge are hidden!" (Colossians 2:3).
Do not only study Christianity - but Christ!
Do not only ponder redemption - but the Redeemer!
Do not only contemplate salvation - but the living Saviour!
In this way, the mind will be convinced, and the heart savingly won to Him. In the person, character and work of Christ - is included all that man can need - and all that God can give!
"Indeed, we have all received grace after grace from His fullness!" (John 1:16).
~Cornelius Tyree~
_______________________________
Altogether Lovely!
"Yes, He is altogether lovely! This is my Beloved, and this is my Friend!" (Song of Songs 5:16).
Why does the world reject the wondrous Saviour?
Why do they abhor Him who is altogether lovely,
And hate Him who is the best Friend of sinners?
O men of the world! what good can you desire which is not in Christ? The excellencies of earth are but His footstool; the excellencies of Heaven are but His throne!
How excellent, then, must He Himself be!
His treasures are infinite - and open for you!
In Jesus are -
riches - if you are poor;
honor - if you are despised;
friendship - if you are forsaken;
help - if you are injured;
mercy - if you are miserable;
joy - if you are disconsolate;
protection - if you are in danger;
deliverance - if you are a captive;
life - if you are mortal; and
all things - if you have nothing at all.
Time and eternity are His - and He can give you all the glorious things of eternity!
Moreover, He can deliver you -
from all your fears;
from sin - the worst of all evils;
from self - the most hurtful of all companions;
from death - the most dreadful of all changes;
from satan - the most subtle of all enemies;
from hell - the most horrible of all prisons; and
from wrath - the most horrifying doom of all sinners!
Now, where will you find such a one as Jesus?
Why, then, refuse life, and seek after death and damnation?
All Heaven is enamored with His beauty!
The longer we look on "created gaieties", the leaner and less lovely they grow; so that, by the time we have viewed them forty, fifty, or sixty years - we see nothing but vanity in the creature! But when ten thousand ages are employed in beholding the perfection and beauty of Jesus - He still appears more and more lovely - even altogether lovely!
Alas! I can say nothing of His true excellencies! They overwhelm my laboring thought, and are too vast for my feeble conception to bring forth!
~James Meikle~
___________________________
This Baffles All Our Comprehension
"So the Word became human and lived here on earth among us" (John 1:14).
What a Transition!
What a Stoop for that Infinite Being who proclaimed Himself the Alpha and the Omega; for "The Ancient of days" to assume the nature and take the form of a cradled infant, sleeping on a virgin mother's breast!
We have no plumb line to sound the depths of that humiliation. We have no arithmetic by which it can be submitted to any process of calculation.
If we can entertain for a moment the shocking supposition of the loftiest created spirit in heaven abjuring his angel nature, and becoming an insect or a worm; we can, in some feeble degree, estimate the descent involved in the transformation.
But, for the Illimitable, Everlasting Jehovah, Himself to become incarnate - the Creator, to take the nature of the created; the Infinite, to be joined with the finite; Deity, to be linked with dust; this baffles all our comprehension!
We can only lie in adoring reverence, and exclaim with the apostle, "O the depth!"
"Wonder, O heavens, and be astonished, O earth!"
~John MacDuff~
Jewels From Tozer
Jewels From Tozer
If we can trust the sufferings of Christ for our sake then we can trust Christ when we suffer for His sake.
The Bible was written in tears, and to tears it yields its best treasures.
The proud man can't worship God any more than the proud devil can...Worship humbles you.
Is it ever possible to overdo the talking about the glory of Christ? Is it ever too often to be in God's presence?
Many things about our salvation are beyond our comprehension, but not beyond our trust.
Some morning, get up and allow the power of God to come on you, and allow Him to bless you.
You are a mirror of the Almighty...this is the reason you were created...your purpose.
Our pursuit of God can be successful just because He is forever seeking to manifest Himself to us.
God get leftovers...We tend to give Him that which we don't need instead of giving Him that which we need.
We should come to church not anticipating entertainment but expecting the high and holy manifestation of God's presence.
It is quite impossible to worship God without loving Him.
God dwells in the heart where praise is.
A holy man is not aware that he is holy...As soon as we begin to talk about how holy we are, we are not holy anymore.
There is an awful lot you do not need to know to find God. The light shines, the voice calls and the Presence is here.
What is wrong with Christians today is that we have the gifts of God but have forgotten the God of gifts.
True and absolute freedom is only found in the presence of God.
As we come to the Bible, we can come with the holy anticipation of actually meeting with God.
We are sent to bless the world, but we are never told to compromise with it.
God doesn't need anything nevertheless He wants worshipers.
Let the affairs of life crowd out the Scriptures from my mind and I have suffered loss where I can least afford it.
Men are not revived because they sin; they sing because they are revived.
I can't sing a lick but that's nobody's business. God listens when I sing to Him and He thinks I am an opera star!
In an effort to get the work of the Lord done we often lose contact with the Lord of work.
When the eyes of the soul looking out meet the eyes of God looking in, heaven has begun right here on earth.
Dare to contend without being contentious. Preserve the truth without hurting people. Love and be charitable.
The most dangerous trap is just living and forgetting that God exists.
May God keep fresh the fountain of our laughter and our tears!
God is never satisfied with anything less than all.
God purposed redemption in Christ before the world began, and His plan does not need any editing by man.
No Christian, if he is right with God, should ever need to hide anything in his life.
Worship is not some performance we do, but a presence we experience.
The key to prayer is simply praying!
Silence is often the most eloquent answer to our critics!
If we try to obey without faith, we get nowhere. If we try to have faith without obedience, it ends in nothing.
We Christians must look sharp that our Christianity does not simply refine our sins without removing them.
What has the church gained if it is popular but there is no conviction, no repentance, no power?
Everything is wrong until Jesus sets it right.
Nothing bothers the devil more than a Christian delighting in God's presence.
Any sermon that is not birthed in prayer is not a message from God no matter how learned the preacher.
Many Christians are satisfied with their destination but they neglect the journey.
If you never mention the Lord in conversation with each other, is it not proof that you are not much concerned about Him?
Outside the will of God, there's nothing I want, and in the will of God there's nothing I fear!
Save me from the error of judging a church by its size, popularity or the amount of its yearly offerings.
There is more healing joy in five minutes of true worship than in five nights of revelry.
God is never impressed with what a man can do. He is more concerned with what a man is.
~A. W. Tozer~
If we can trust the sufferings of Christ for our sake then we can trust Christ when we suffer for His sake.
The Bible was written in tears, and to tears it yields its best treasures.
The proud man can't worship God any more than the proud devil can...Worship humbles you.
Is it ever possible to overdo the talking about the glory of Christ? Is it ever too often to be in God's presence?
Many things about our salvation are beyond our comprehension, but not beyond our trust.
Some morning, get up and allow the power of God to come on you, and allow Him to bless you.
You are a mirror of the Almighty...this is the reason you were created...your purpose.
Our pursuit of God can be successful just because He is forever seeking to manifest Himself to us.
God get leftovers...We tend to give Him that which we don't need instead of giving Him that which we need.
We should come to church not anticipating entertainment but expecting the high and holy manifestation of God's presence.
It is quite impossible to worship God without loving Him.
God dwells in the heart where praise is.
A holy man is not aware that he is holy...As soon as we begin to talk about how holy we are, we are not holy anymore.
There is an awful lot you do not need to know to find God. The light shines, the voice calls and the Presence is here.
What is wrong with Christians today is that we have the gifts of God but have forgotten the God of gifts.
True and absolute freedom is only found in the presence of God.
As we come to the Bible, we can come with the holy anticipation of actually meeting with God.
We are sent to bless the world, but we are never told to compromise with it.
God doesn't need anything nevertheless He wants worshipers.
Let the affairs of life crowd out the Scriptures from my mind and I have suffered loss where I can least afford it.
Men are not revived because they sin; they sing because they are revived.
I can't sing a lick but that's nobody's business. God listens when I sing to Him and He thinks I am an opera star!
In an effort to get the work of the Lord done we often lose contact with the Lord of work.
When the eyes of the soul looking out meet the eyes of God looking in, heaven has begun right here on earth.
Dare to contend without being contentious. Preserve the truth without hurting people. Love and be charitable.
The most dangerous trap is just living and forgetting that God exists.
May God keep fresh the fountain of our laughter and our tears!
God is never satisfied with anything less than all.
God purposed redemption in Christ before the world began, and His plan does not need any editing by man.
No Christian, if he is right with God, should ever need to hide anything in his life.
Worship is not some performance we do, but a presence we experience.
The key to prayer is simply praying!
Silence is often the most eloquent answer to our critics!
If we try to obey without faith, we get nowhere. If we try to have faith without obedience, it ends in nothing.
We Christians must look sharp that our Christianity does not simply refine our sins without removing them.
What has the church gained if it is popular but there is no conviction, no repentance, no power?
Everything is wrong until Jesus sets it right.
Nothing bothers the devil more than a Christian delighting in God's presence.
Any sermon that is not birthed in prayer is not a message from God no matter how learned the preacher.
Many Christians are satisfied with their destination but they neglect the journey.
If you never mention the Lord in conversation with each other, is it not proof that you are not much concerned about Him?
Outside the will of God, there's nothing I want, and in the will of God there's nothing I fear!
Save me from the error of judging a church by its size, popularity or the amount of its yearly offerings.
There is more healing joy in five minutes of true worship than in five nights of revelry.
God is never impressed with what a man can do. He is more concerned with what a man is.
~A. W. Tozer~
Christian Mercy Explained and Enforced # 2
Christian Mercy Explained and Enforced # 2
2. The PROPERTIES of Christian Mercy.
1. Mercy is supported and directed by the principles of the New Testament, and not merely by the force of natural feeling. It will be remembered that I am now speaking of Christian mercy - or, in other words, of that compassion which is represented in the Word of God, as the work of the Divine Spirit, which supposes the previous existence of the Christian character, and which is urged by the considerations peculiar to the gospel. The renewed mind of a believer is represented, as the garden of the Lord; and all the virtues of sanctification as the fruits have been planted in it.
Paul expressly declares that though a man gives all his goods to feed the poor, and has not love - that is, love to God, leading to a proper regard of our fellow-creatures - he is nothing. Many have deluded themselves on this subject by the dreadful perversion of a passage of inspired truth, which utters a sentiment the most remote from that which it has been made to promulgate. "Charity," say these people, "shall cover the multitude of sins." Now, by charity, here, is meant love; and the sentiment contained in the expression is nothing more than that love will conceal with a friendly covering, instead of publishing to the world, a multitude of imperfections in those we regard. This is its true meaning. If it meant that God accepts those people who whose alms-deeds outweigh their crimes - it would justify all the vile and horrid hypocrisy of the darkest age of popery, when to build a church or found a monastery was declared by lying priests to the murderer or adulterer, to be a sufficient expiation for all the crimes of the most impure or bloody life; for it lesser acts of benevolence will cover lesser sins, there are no vices so flagrant which may not be covered on this principle, by an increase of munificence.
Let it not be said, that the motive of a merciful act is of no consequence, provided the compassion is felt, and the relief communicated. It is no matter what the motive which dictated the act; whether the doer of it had the glory of God in view, or whether he was in infidel. But our actions sustain other relations, which make it of infinite and eternal consequence under what motives, and upon what principles, they are performed. The question is, what influence our conduct will have, not upon the comfort of others, but upon our own eternal destiny; not what may be demanded by the world, but what may be and is required by that Omniscient Being, to whom the very soul is an open page. In short, the question is not what constitutes worldly morality, but what is essential to pure evangelical religion.
We observe then, that true Christian mercy - that which will be accepted in the sight of God, and which will have connection with our celestial happiness, is exercised in designed obedience to God's command, in express limitation of His conduct, and with an earnest desire to promote His glory. "Be merciful, as your Father in heaven is merciful." This disposition is cherished by a devout contemplation of that mercy which shines from heaven upon the human race through the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. With other men, mercy is merely a feeling - with the Christian it is a principle. The Christian thinks that for one needy person to compassionate another; that if God has pitied him as to deliver his soul from eternal misery, the least spark of gratitude must lead him to relieve the needs of his fellow humans. The Christian desires to honor God. They expect, by deeds of mercy, to merit eternal life; but the Christian depends upon the righteousness of Christ.
Christian mercy displays tenderness of MANNER. It is like that charity which is kind and resembles that goodness of our heavenly Father, which gives to all men liberally, and upbraids not."
3. Christian mercy adds the greatest COURAGE IN ACTION - to the greatest tenderness of feeling. What would the needy do if there were no other pity than this in the world, and no other benefactors than these to be found? But true Christian mercy consults not her pleasure, but the calls of duty, and flies to the scene of need and suffering, where, amidst filth, and poverty, and disease, comforts a human being to whom he is anxious to convey the comforts of one world, and the hopes of another. This is mercy!
4. Christian mercy unites a propensity to relieve ALL misery, on its own account.
5. Christian mercy should be characterized by DILIGENCE. It is said of our Lord, that "he ever went about doing good." and the history of His life proves the truth of it.
6. Christian mercy should be attended with SELF-DENIAL. We must stand prepared to make sacrifices, and to endure hardships. Did our Lord, without effort and without humiliation, show mercy to all? Can that man, who will not make the smallest sacrifice in mercy's cause, persuade himself that he is a disciple of this merciful, self-denying Redeemer?
7. Remember your own dependence on Divine mercy, both for all the comforts of this life, and all the blessings of the life to come. "God be merciful to me a sinner," is the humble petition which best suits our character in every approach to His throne. Be merciful, in every other case of human misery, to the extent of your ability. Many will bless you for your benevolence. And even if gratitude had left the earth, your witness is in heaven, and your reward is on high. A day is approaching when, not a cup of cold water administered to the parched lips of wretchedness, and in imitation of the mercy of God, shall be either forgotten, or overlooked, by Him who has the destiny of man at His disposal!
~John Angell James~
(The End)
2. The PROPERTIES of Christian Mercy.
1. Mercy is supported and directed by the principles of the New Testament, and not merely by the force of natural feeling. It will be remembered that I am now speaking of Christian mercy - or, in other words, of that compassion which is represented in the Word of God, as the work of the Divine Spirit, which supposes the previous existence of the Christian character, and which is urged by the considerations peculiar to the gospel. The renewed mind of a believer is represented, as the garden of the Lord; and all the virtues of sanctification as the fruits have been planted in it.
Paul expressly declares that though a man gives all his goods to feed the poor, and has not love - that is, love to God, leading to a proper regard of our fellow-creatures - he is nothing. Many have deluded themselves on this subject by the dreadful perversion of a passage of inspired truth, which utters a sentiment the most remote from that which it has been made to promulgate. "Charity," say these people, "shall cover the multitude of sins." Now, by charity, here, is meant love; and the sentiment contained in the expression is nothing more than that love will conceal with a friendly covering, instead of publishing to the world, a multitude of imperfections in those we regard. This is its true meaning. If it meant that God accepts those people who whose alms-deeds outweigh their crimes - it would justify all the vile and horrid hypocrisy of the darkest age of popery, when to build a church or found a monastery was declared by lying priests to the murderer or adulterer, to be a sufficient expiation for all the crimes of the most impure or bloody life; for it lesser acts of benevolence will cover lesser sins, there are no vices so flagrant which may not be covered on this principle, by an increase of munificence.
Let it not be said, that the motive of a merciful act is of no consequence, provided the compassion is felt, and the relief communicated. It is no matter what the motive which dictated the act; whether the doer of it had the glory of God in view, or whether he was in infidel. But our actions sustain other relations, which make it of infinite and eternal consequence under what motives, and upon what principles, they are performed. The question is, what influence our conduct will have, not upon the comfort of others, but upon our own eternal destiny; not what may be demanded by the world, but what may be and is required by that Omniscient Being, to whom the very soul is an open page. In short, the question is not what constitutes worldly morality, but what is essential to pure evangelical religion.
We observe then, that true Christian mercy - that which will be accepted in the sight of God, and which will have connection with our celestial happiness, is exercised in designed obedience to God's command, in express limitation of His conduct, and with an earnest desire to promote His glory. "Be merciful, as your Father in heaven is merciful." This disposition is cherished by a devout contemplation of that mercy which shines from heaven upon the human race through the Cross of our Lord Jesus Christ. With other men, mercy is merely a feeling - with the Christian it is a principle. The Christian thinks that for one needy person to compassionate another; that if God has pitied him as to deliver his soul from eternal misery, the least spark of gratitude must lead him to relieve the needs of his fellow humans. The Christian desires to honor God. They expect, by deeds of mercy, to merit eternal life; but the Christian depends upon the righteousness of Christ.
Christian mercy displays tenderness of MANNER. It is like that charity which is kind and resembles that goodness of our heavenly Father, which gives to all men liberally, and upbraids not."
3. Christian mercy adds the greatest COURAGE IN ACTION - to the greatest tenderness of feeling. What would the needy do if there were no other pity than this in the world, and no other benefactors than these to be found? But true Christian mercy consults not her pleasure, but the calls of duty, and flies to the scene of need and suffering, where, amidst filth, and poverty, and disease, comforts a human being to whom he is anxious to convey the comforts of one world, and the hopes of another. This is mercy!
4. Christian mercy unites a propensity to relieve ALL misery, on its own account.
5. Christian mercy should be characterized by DILIGENCE. It is said of our Lord, that "he ever went about doing good." and the history of His life proves the truth of it.
6. Christian mercy should be attended with SELF-DENIAL. We must stand prepared to make sacrifices, and to endure hardships. Did our Lord, without effort and without humiliation, show mercy to all? Can that man, who will not make the smallest sacrifice in mercy's cause, persuade himself that he is a disciple of this merciful, self-denying Redeemer?
7. Remember your own dependence on Divine mercy, both for all the comforts of this life, and all the blessings of the life to come. "God be merciful to me a sinner," is the humble petition which best suits our character in every approach to His throne. Be merciful, in every other case of human misery, to the extent of your ability. Many will bless you for your benevolence. And even if gratitude had left the earth, your witness is in heaven, and your reward is on high. A day is approaching when, not a cup of cold water administered to the parched lips of wretchedness, and in imitation of the mercy of God, shall be either forgotten, or overlooked, by Him who has the destiny of man at His disposal!
~John Angell James~
(The End)
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)