From: [EMAIL PROTECTED] daily devotional
Evening...
John 14:26 The Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost.
This age is peculiarly the dispensation of the Holy Spirit, in which Jesus
cheers us, not by His personal presence, as He shall do by-and-by, but by the
indwelling and constant abiding of the Holy Ghost, who is evermore the
Comforter of the church. It is His office to console the hearts of God's
people. He convinces of sin; He illuminates and instructs; but still the main
part of His work lies in making glad the hearts of the renewed, in confirming
the weak, and lifting up all those that be bowed down. He does this by
revealing Jesus to them. The Holy Spirit consoles, but Christ is the
consolation. If we may use the figure, the Holy Spirit is the Physician, but
Jesus is the medicine. He heals the wound, but it is by applying the holy
ointment of Christ's name and grace. He takes not of His own things, but of the
things of Christ. So if we give to the Holy Spirit the Greek name of Paraclete,
as we sometimes do, then our heart confers on our blessed Lord Jesus the title
of Paraclesis. If the one be the Comforter, the other is the Comfort. Now, with
such rich provision for his need, why should the Christian be sad and
desponding? The Holy Spirit has graciously engaged to be thy Comforter: dost
thou imagine, O thou weak and trembling believer, that He will be negligent of
His sacred trust? Canst thou suppose that He has undertaken what He cannot or
will not perform? If it be His especial work to strengthen thee, and to comfort
thee, dost thou suppose He has forgotten His business, or that He will fail in
the loving office which He sustains towards thee? Nay, think not so hardly of
the tender and blessed Spirit whose name is "the Comforter." He delights to
give the oil of joy for mourning, and the garment of praise for the spirit of
heaviness. Trust thou in Him, and He will surely comfort thee till the house of
mourning is closed for ever, and the marriage feast has begun.
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Amos 7:7-9
(King James Version)
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(7) Thus he shewed me: and, behold, the LORD stood upon a
wall made by a plumbline, with a plumbline in his hand. (8) And the LORD said
unto me, Amos, what seest thou? And I said, A plumbline. Then said the LORD,
Behold, I will set a plumbline in the midst of my people Israel: I will not
again pass by them any more: (9) And the high places of Isaac shall be
desolate, and the sanctuaries of Israel shall be laid waste; and I will rise
against the house of Jeroboam with the sword.
In construction, the plumb line tests whether what was
erected is perpendicular to the square, that is, if it is straight up and down,
if it is upright. It provides a standard against which one can measure what he
has built. Metaphorically, when God draws near with the plumb line, He is
looking for those people who are living and abiding in His grace and His law.
The Israelites' moral standards had degenerated, so their religious profession
was not verified by the right kind of works. They were not upright; they failed
the test.
Amos has no opportunity to intercede at this point. God
will no longer relent. "I will not pass by them anymore" means that God would
not overlook their sins any longer. And, if He will not pass by them, He must
pass through them. The plumb line shows that He will pass through "with the
sword" in judgment; His patience and forgiveness have finally ended. He could
no longer defer the punishment for their sins—the time had come to destroy them.
God passes through by destroying "the high places of
Isaac," the altars and idols of the false religions responsible for the moral,
spiritual, and ethical decline of the people. They worshipped Baal and a host
of other foreign deities (Judges 10:6). They set up sacred pillars and idols
throughout the land (I Kings 14:23; II Kings 17:10-13). Some of them even
burned their sons in the fire to Molech (Ezekiel 16:20-21). Through their
spiritual harlotry, they abused grace—the free, unmerited pardon of God—and
rejected His law.
"The sanctuaries of Israel," the religious shrines of
Bethel, Dan, Gilgal, and Beersheba, would also be among the first to fall. They
were the fountainheads of the attitudes of the nation. In them the people were
taught to seek the material prosperity that characterized the nation, and in
part they sought this physical abundance through cultic fornication and
fertility rituals done in the name of the eternal God. The religions taught the
people how to sin and do it religiously.
Next, "the house of Jeroboam" would fall through war. Amos
refers to Jeroboam I, after whom Jeroboam II was named, and worse, after whom
he followed in his sins. God selected Jeroboam I to become king of the northern
ten tribes of Israel after Solomon (I Kings 11:29-31), however He made the
continuance of Jeroboam's dynasty contingent upon his obedience (verse 38).
But Jeroboam did not trust God. He thought that the
religious festivals and sacrifices would entice Israel to return to David's
line in Judah (I Kings 12:25-27). To counter that possibility, he set up
counterfeit shrines in Bethel and Dan and changed the Feast of Tabernacles from
the seventh month to the eighth (I Kings 12:27-33). Jeroboam turned away from
the law of God, causing the people to sin.
Historians examine economics, social conditions, and
military strength to determine what causes the rise or fall of nations, but God
shows that His purpose and the morality of the people are the true causes.
Thus, God makes sure that the two major motivators of Israel's spiritual
decline, the religious and political leadership, would feel His wrath first
(Isaiah 9:13-16).
John W. Ritenbaugh
From Prepare to Meet Your God! (The Book of Amos) (Part
Two)
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daily devotional
Evening...
Mark 16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved.
Mr. MacDonald asked the inhabitants of the island of St. Kilda how a man must
be saved. An old man replied, "We shall be saved if we repent, and forsake our
sins, and turn to God." "Yes," said a middle-aged female, "and with a true
heart too." "Ay," rejoined a third, "and with prayer"; and, added a fourth, "It
must be the prayer of the heart." "And we must be diligent too," said a fifth,
"in keeping the commandments." Thus, each having contributed his mite, feeling
that a very decent creed had been made up, they all looked and listened for the
preacher's approbation, but they had aroused his deepest pity. The carnal mind
always maps out for itself a way in which self can work and become great, but
the Lord's way is quite the reverse. Believing and being baptized are no
matters of merit to be gloried in-they are so simple that boasting is excluded,
and free grace bears the palm. It may be that the reader is unsaved-what is the
reason? Do you think the way of salvation as laid down in the text to be
dubious? How can that be when God has pledged His own word for its certainty?
Do you think it too easy? Why, then, do you not attend to it? Its ease leaves
those without excuse who neglect it. To believe is simply to trust, to depend,
to rely upon Christ Jesus. To be baptized is to submit to the ordinance which
our Lord fulfilled at Jordan, to which the converted ones submitted at
Pentecost, to which the jailer yielded obedience the very night of his
conversion. The outward sign saves not, but it sets forth to us our death,
burial, and resurrection with Jesus, and, like the Lord's Supper, is not to be
neglected. Reader, do you believe in Jesus? Then, dear friend, dismiss your
fears, you shall be saved. Are you still an unbeliever, then remember there is
but one door, and if you will not enter by it you will perish in your sins.
Morning...
John 4:14 Whosoever drinketh of the water that I shall give him shall never
thirst.
He who is a believer in Jesus finds enough in his Lord to satisfy him now,
and to content him for evermore. The believer is not the man whose days are
weary for want of comfort, and whose nights are long from absence of
heart-cheering thought, for he finds in religion such a spring of joy, such a
fountain of consolation, that he is content and happy. Put him in a dungeon and
he will find good company; place him in a barren wilderness, he will eat the
bread of heaven; drive him away from friendship, he will meet the "friend that
sticketh closer than a brother." Blast all his gourds, and he will find shadow
beneath the Rock of Ages; sap the foundation of his earthly hopes, but his
heart will still be fixed, trusting in the Lord. The heart is as insatiable as
the grave till Jesus enters it, and then it is a cup full to overflowing. There
is such a fulness in Christ that He alone is the believer's all. The true saint
is so completely satisfied with the all-sufficiency of Jesus that he thirsts no
more-except it be for deeper draughts of the living fountain. In that sweet
manner, believer, shalt thou thirst; it shall not be a thirst of pain, but of
loving desire; thou wilt find it a sweet thing to be panting after a fuller
enjoyment of Jesus' love. One in days of yore said, "I have been sinking my
bucket down into the well full often, but now my thirst after Jesus has become
so insatiable, that I long to put the well itself to my lips, and drink right
on." Is this the feeling of thine heart now, believer? Dost thou feel that all
thy desires are satisfied in Jesus, and that thou hast no want now, but to know
more of Him;, and to have closer fellowship with Him? Then come continually to
the fountain, and take of the water of life freely. Jesus will never think you
take too much, but will ever welcome you, saying, "Drink, yea, drink
abundantly, O beloved."
Revelation 13:4
(New King James Version)
(4) So they worshiped the dragon who gave authority to the
beast; and they worshiped the beast, saying, “Who is like the beast? Who is
able to make war with him?”
Copyright © 1982 by Thomas Nelson, Inc.
This is a system that puts people in fear. It manipulates
and controls to its own advantage—not to the good of the governed, but its own.
It has an attitude that hates people and likes destruction. It is adversarial.
Now contrast that with sheep, and especially with a lamb.
They must be the most docile of all animals. Biblically, a lamb symbolizes
gentleness, innocence, sometimes a childlike vulnerability. It is not
aggressive. It is easily led and controlled by a shepherd.
Christ symbolically is the Lamb of God (John 1:29, 36).
"Lamb" is used in reference to Jesus Christ twenty-seven times in the book of
Revelation. The Beast is an adversary of Christ, and exudes not gentleness, not
goodness, not kindness, not innocence, but all of the opposites of those
traits.
John W. Ritenbaugh
From The Spiritual Mark of the Beast
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