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Daily devotions for 06-03-2005:
Devotion: Morning and Evening
Morning Title: Battle of the Spirit
Evening Title: Good Master
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Morning: Battle of the Spirit
"For the flesh lusteth against the Spirit, and the Spirit against the flesh."
--Galatians 5:17
In every believer's heart there is a constant struggle between the old nature
and the new. The old nature is very active, and loses no opportunity of plying
all the weapons of its
deadly armoury against newborn grace; while on the other hand, the new nature
is ever on the watch to resist and destroy its enemy. Grace within us will
employ prayer, and faith, and hope, and love, to cast out the evil; it takes
unto it the "whole armour of God," and wrestles earnestly. These two opposing
natures will never cease to struggle so long as we are in this world. The
battle of "Christian" with "Apollyon" lasted three hours, but the battle of
Christian with himself lasted all the way from the Wicket Gate in the river
Jordan. The enemy is so securely entrenched within us that he can never be
driven out while we are in this body: but although we are closely beset, and
often in sore conflict, we have an Almighty helper, even Jesus, the Captain of
our salvation, who is ever with
us, and who assures us that we shall eventually come off more than conquerors
through Him. With such assistance the new-born nature is more than a match for
its foes. Are you fighting with the adversary to-day? Are Satan, the world, and
the flesh, all against you? Be not discouraged nor dismayed. Fight on! For God
Himself is with you; Jehovah Nissi is your banner, and Jehovah Rophi is the
healer of your wounds. Fear not, you shall overcome, for who can defeat
Omnipotence? Fight on, "looking unto Jesus"; and though long and stern be the
conflict, sweet will be the victory, and glorious the promised reward.
"From strength to strength go on;
Wrestle, and fight, and pray,
Tread all the powers of darkness down,
And win the well-fought day."
Evening: Good Master
"Good Master." --Matthew 19:16
If the young man in the gospel used this title in speaking to our Lord, how
much more fitly may I thus address Him! He is indeed my Master in both senses,
a ruling Master and a teaching Master. I delight to run upon His errands, and
to sit at His feet. I am both His servant and His disciple, and count it my
highest honour to own the double character. If He should ask me why I call Him
"good," I should have a ready answer. It is true that "there is none good but
one, that is, God," but then He is God, and all the goodness of Deity shines
forth in Him. In my experience, I have found Him good, so good, indeed, that
all the good I have has come to me through Him. He was good to me when I was
dead in sin, for He raised me by His Spirit's power; He has been good to me in
all my needs, trials, struggles, and sorrows.
Never could there be a better Master, for His service is freedom, His rule is
love: I wish I
were one thousandth part as good a servant. When He teaches me as my Rabbi, He
is unspeakably good, His doctrine is divine, His manner is condescending, His
spirit is gentleness itself.
No error mingles with His instruction--pure is the golden truth which He brings
forth, and all His teachings lead to goodness, sanctifying as well as edifying
the disciple. Angels find Him a good Master and delight to pay their homage at
His footstool. The ancient saints proved Him to be a good Master, and each of
them rejoiced to sing, "I am Thy servant, O Lord!" My own humble testimony must
certainly be to the same effect. I will bear this witness before my friends and
neighbours, for possibly they may be led by my testimony to seek my Lord Jesus
as their Master. O that they would do so! They would never repent so wise a
deed. If they would but take His easy yoke, they would find themselves in so
royal a service that they would enlist in it for ever.
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Daily devotions for 06-04-2005:
Devotion: Morning and Evening
Morning Title: The King's Service
Evening Title: Lowliness of Heart
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Morning: The King's Service
"These were potters, and those that dwelt among plants and hedges: there they
dwelt with the king for his work." --1 Chronicles 4:23
Potters were the very highest grade of workers, but "the king" needed potters,
and therefore they were in royal service, although the material upon which they
worked was nothing but clay. We, too, may be engaged in the most menial part of
the Lord's work, but it is a great privilege to do anything for "the king"; and
therefore we will abide in our calling, hoping that, "although we have lien
among the pots, yet shall we be as the
wings of a dove covered with silver, and her feathers with yellow gold." The
text tells us of
those who dwelt among plants and hedges, having rough, rustic, hedging and
ditching work to do.
They may have desired to live in the city, amid its life, society, and
refinement, but they kept their appointed places, for they also were doing the
king's work. The place of our habitation is fixed, and we are not to remove
from it out of whim and caprice, but seek to serve the Lord in it, by being a
blessing to those among whom we reside. These potters and gardeners had royal
company, for they dwelt "with the king" and although among hedges and plants,
they dwelt with the king there.
No lawful place, or gracious occupation, however mean, can debar us from
communion with our divine Lord. In visiting hovels, swarming lodging-houses,
workhouses, or gaols, we may go with the king. In all works of faith we may
count upon Jesus' fellowship. It is when we are in His work that we may reckon
upon His smile. Ye unknown workers who are occupied for your Lord amid the dirt
and wretchedness of the lowest of the low, be of good cheer, for jewels have
been found upon dunghills ere now, earthen pots have been filled with heavenly
treasure, and ill weeds have been transformed into precious flowers.
Dwell ye with the King for His work, and when He writes His chronicles your
name shall be recorded.
Evening: Lowliness of Heart
"He humbled Himself." --Philippians 2:8
Jesus is the great teacher of lowliness of heart.
We need daily to learn of Him. See the Master taking a towel and washing His
disciples' feet!
Follower of Christ, wilt thou not humble thyself?
See Him as the Servant of servants, and surely thou canst not be proud! Is not
this sentence the compendium of His biography, "He humbled Himself"? Was He not
on earth always stripping off first one robe of honour and then another, till,
naked, He was fastened to the cross, and there did He not empty out His inmost
self, pouring out His life-blood, giving up for all of us, till they laid Him
penniless in a borrowed grave? How low was our dear Redeemer brought! How then
can we be proud? Stand at the foot of the cross, and count the purple drops by
which you have been cleansed; see the thorn-crown; mark His
scourged shoulders, still gushing with encrimsoned rills; see hands and feet
given up to the rough iron, and His whole self to mockery and scorn; see the
bitterness, and the pangs, and the throes of inward grief, showing themselves
in His outward frame; hear the thrilling shriek, "My God, my God, why hast Thou
forsaken Me?" And if you do not lie prostrate on the ground before that cross,
you have never seen it: if you are not humbled in the presence of Jesus, you do
not know Him.
You were so lost that nothing could save you but the sacrifice of God's only
begotten. Think of that, and as Jesus stooped for you, bow yourself in
lowliness at His feet. A sense of Christ's amazing love to us has a greater
tendency to humble us than even a consciousness of our own guilt. May the
Lord bring us in contemplation to Calvary, then our position will no longer be
that of the pompous man of pride, but we shall take the humble place of one who
loves much because much has been forgiven him. Pride cannot live beneath the
cross. Let us sit there and learn our lesson, and then rise and carry it into
practice.
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Daily devotions for 06-05-2005:
Devotion: Morning and Evening
Morning Title: A Dim Reflection
Evening Title: Glorious In Victory
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Morning: A Dim Reflection
"The kindness and love of God our Saviour." --Titus 3:4
How sweet it is to behold the Saviour communing with His own beloved people!
There can be nothing more delightful than, by the Divine Spirit, to be led into
this fertile field of delight. Let the mind for an instant consider the history
of the Redeemer's love, and a thousand enchanting acts of affection will
suggest themselves, all of which have had for their design the weaving of the
heart into Christ, and the intertwisting of the thoughts and emotions of the
renewed soul with the mind of Jesus. When we meditate upon this amazing love,
and behold the all-glorious Kinsman of the Church endowing her with all His
ancient wealth, our souls may well faint for joy.
Who is he that can endure such a weight of love?
That partial sense of it which the Holy Spirit is sometimes pleased to afford,
is more than the soul can contain; how transporting must be a complete view of
it! When the soul shall have understanding to discern all the Saviour's gifts,
wisdom wherewith to estimate them, and time in which to meditate upon them,
such as the world to come will afford us, we shall then commune with Jesus in a
nearer manner than at present.
But who can imagine the sweetness of such fellowship? It must be one of the
things which have not entered into the heart of man, but which God hath
prepared for them that love Him. Oh, to burst open the door of our Joseph's
granaries, and see the plenty which He hath stored up for us! This will
overwhelm us with love. By faith we see, as in a glass darkly, the reflected
image of His unbounded treasures, but when we shall actually see the heavenly
things themselves, with our own eyes, how deep will be the stream of
fellowship in which our soul shall bathe itself!
Till then our loudest sonnets shall be reserved for our loving benefactor,
Jesus Christ our Lord, whose love to us is wonderful, passing the love of women.
Evening: Glorious In Victory
"Received up into glory." --1 Timothy 3:16
We have seen our well-beloved Lord in the days of His flesh, humiliated and
sore vexed; for He was "despised and rejected of men, a man of sorrows, and
acquainted with grief." He whose brightness is as the morning, wore the
sackcloth of sorrow as His daily dress: shame was His mantle, and reproach was
His vesture. Yet now, inasmuch as He has triumphed over all the powers of
darkness upon the bloody tree, our faith beholds our King returning with dyed
garments from Edom, robed in the splendour of victory. How glorious must He
have been in the eyes of seraphs, when a cloud received Him out of mortal
sight, and He ascended up to heaven! Now He wears the glory which He had
with God or ever the earth was, and yet another glory above all--that which He
has well earned in the fight against sin, death, and hell. As victor He wears
the illustrious crown. Hark how the song swells high! It is a new and sweeter
song:
"Worthy is the Lamb that was slain, for He hath redeemed us unto God by His
blood!"
He wears the glory of an Intercessor who can never fail, of a Prince who can
never be
defeated, of a Conqueror who has vanquished every foe, of a Lord who has the
heart's allegiance of every subject. Jesus wears all the glory which the pomp
of heaven can bestow upon Him, which ten thousand times ten thousand angels can
minister
to Him. You cannot with your utmost stretch of imagination conceive His
exceeding greatness; yet there will be a further revelation of it when He shall
descend from heaven in great power, with all the holy angels--"Then shall He
sit upon the throne of His glory." Oh, the splendour of that glory! It
will ravish His people's hearts. Nor is this the close, for eternity shall
sound His praise, "Thy throne, O God, is for ever and ever!" Reader, if you
would joy in Christ's glory hereafter, He must be glorious in your sight now.
[Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
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