If the church is the community of the forgiven, then all its relationships will be marked by a forgiveness which is not a mere form of words, but an essential characteristic . . .

To believe that God is omnipotent, however strongly, with whatever full persuasion, when that belief is the mere admission of a dogma in theology, a general truth or proposition, proved by reason and affirmed in Scripture; so to believe and be fully persuaded and assured that what God has promised he is able also to perform; will go but a little way towards strengthening or establishing you in that faith which glorifies God. But let me again remind you that the faith in question is believing God; not believing something about God, but believing God. It is a personal dealing of God with you and of you with God. He and you come together; he to speak, you to hear; he to promise, you to believe; you to ask, he to give.
Robert S. Candlish

Hold God's faithfulness. Abraham held God's faith and offered up Isaac, accounting that God was able to raise him up. Moses held God's faith and led the millions of Israel into the waste howling wilderness. Joshua knew Israel well and was ignorant neither of the fortifications of the Canaanites, nor of their martial prowess; but he held God's faithfulness and led Israel across Jordan . . . All God's giants have been weak men (and women) who did great things for God because they reckoned on God being with them . . .
Oh! beloved friends, if there is a living God, faithful and true, let us hold His faithfulness. Holding His faithfulness, we may go into every province of China. Holding His faithfulness, we may face, with calm and sober but confident assurance of victory, every difficulty and danger. We may count on grace for the work, on pecuniary aid, on needful facilities, and on ultimate success. Let us not give Him a partial trust, but daily, hourly, served Him, "holding God's faithfulness."

Hudson Taylor, 19th Century Missionary to China

And I rather think that a faithfulness unsustained by pleasant emotion is far purer and reliable than one which depends on tender feelings. Faith which is built on emotion is resting on a very changeable foundation.
Francois Fenelon

Oswald Chambers writes: "The summing up of Our Lord's teaching is that the relationship which He demands is an impossible one unless He has done a supernatural work in us. . . The Sermon on the Mount is not an ideal, it is a statement of what will happen in me when Jesus Christ has altered my disposition and put in a disposition like His own. Jesus Christ (in me) is the only One who can fulfill the Sermon on the Mount. If we are to be disciples of Jesus, we must be made disciples supernaturally. . ."
Heavenly Father, more and more I find this to be the case. You'd think I would know by now that in my own strength - whether its confronting temptations, dealing with attitudes, preaching a sermon - WHATEVER - I'm nothing and you are everything. Today, Father, please make me a window through which people can see and hear from and be met by Jesus. In Jesus' Name I pray this.

In the natural life our ambitions alter as we develop; in the Christian life the goal is given at the beginning, the beginning and the end are the same, that is, our Lord Himself. We start with Christ and we end with Him - "until we all attain to the stature of the manhood of Christ Jesus," not to our idea of what the Christian life should be. The aim of (the Christian) is to do God's will, not to be useful, not to win the heathen; he is useful and he does win the heathen, but that is not his aim. His aim is to do the will of his Lord.

Oswald Chambers

Just as there are certain times in a Christian's day for speaking the Word, particularly the time of daily worship and prayer together, so the day also needs certain times of silence under the Word and silence that comes out of the Word. These will mainly be the times before and after hearing the Word. The Word comes not to the noisemakers but to those who are silent. The stillness of the temple is the sign of God's holy presence in the Word. . . We are silent before hearing the Word because our thoughts are already focused on the Word, as children are quiet when they enter their father's room. We are silent after hearing the Word because the Word is still speaking and living and dwelling within us. We are silent early in the morning because God should have the first word, and we are silent before going to bed because the last word also belongs to God. We remain silent solely for the sake of the Word, not thereby to dishonor the Word but rather to honor and receive it properly.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer

Probably we have head the sermon illustration about the wearied and discouraged young artist who put his head down on the table and slept beside the oil painting he had struggled over for weeks. No one could accuse him of not giving the work his best try. He had poured all the talent that he had into the picture.
While the artist slept, his painting master quietly entered the room and went to the sleeping boy, picked up a brush, and with his skilled hands began painting. With just a few touches, the beauty that had eluded the young artist began to appear. In just a few minutes the canvas became all that the young artist wanted it to be.
While that kind of teaching may be questionable, many of us need to be reminded that when we are tired and spent and lay down whaever our toiling might be, our own great Master will make perfect our endeavors for Him. From our service He will remove every stain, every blemish, and every failure. To our service He will give the brightest luster and highest honor. Shall we not bring ourselves to the One who can make us better?
William 'Billy' Sunday

Because of who God is and what Jesus Christ has done in dying for us, changing the throne of judgment into a throne of grace, we who trust Christ are to draw near the throne of grace in confidence. If we came in our own merit, we could have no confidence at all. The throne of God would be a place of terror. But since God has done what was needed to take away all judgment for our sin, it is now sin for us to come in any other way but with confidence. If we come in confidence, we can come knowing that God will do exactly what the author of Hebrews says he will do and we will indeed "find grace to help us in our time of need". . . Whatever our need may be! Do you seek forgiveness for sin? You will find God's grace forgiving you for every sin. So you need strength for daily living? You will find the grace of God providing strength. Do you need comfort because of some great loss? God will provide comfort. Direction? Encouragement? Wisdom? These as well.

Begin with thanking God for some little thing, and then go on, day by day, adding to your subjects of praise; thus you will find their numbers grow wonderfully; and, in the same proportion, will your subjects of murmuring and complaining diminish, until you see in everything some cause for thanksgiving. If you cannot begin with anything positive, begin with something negative. If your whole lot seems only filled with causes for discontent, at any rate there is some trial that has not been appointed you; and you may thank God for its being withheld from you. It is certain that the more you try to praise, the more you will see how your path and your lying down are beset with mercies, and that the God of love is ever watching to do you good.
Priscilla Maurice

"We then speak as though we no longer had "a proper joy and certainty" about this way, or, still worse, as though God and God's Word were no longer as clearly present with us as they used to be. In all this, we are ultimately trying to get round what the New Testament calls 'patience' and 'testing.' Paul, at any rate, did not begin to reflect whether his way was the right one when opposition and suffering threatened, nor did Luther. They were both quite certain and glad that they should remain disciples and followers of their Lord. Dear brothers, our real trouble is not doubt about the way upon which we have set out, but our failure to be patient, to keep quiet. We still cannot imagine that today God really doesn't want anything new from us, but simply to prove us in the old way. That is too petty, too monotonous, too undemanding for us. And we simply cannot be constant with the fact that God's cause is not always the successful one, that we really could be 'unsuccessful' and yet be on the right road. But this is where we find out whether we have begun in faith or in a burst of enthusiasm.

Dietrich Bonhoeffer

"I used to ask God to help me. Then I asked if I might help him. I ended up by asking him to do his work through me."

Hudson Taylor

Joseph Eliot writes: "I find that while faith is steady nothing can disquiet me, and when faith totters nothing can establish me. If I ramble out among means and creatures, I am presently lost, and can come to no end. But if I stay myself on God, and leave Him to work in His own way and time, I am at rest, and can lie down and sleep in a promise, though a thousand rise up against me. Therefore my way is not to cast beforehand, but to walk with God by the day. Keep close to God, and then you need fear nothing. Maintain secret and intimate acquaintance with Him, and then a little of the creature will go a great way. Crowd not religion into a corner of the day. Would men spend those hours they wear out in plots and devices in communion with God, and leave all on Him by venturesome believing, they would have more peace and comfort."
The prophet Isaiah writes: "They that wait(KJV) upon the Lord shall renew their strength. They will soar on wings like eagles. They will run and not grow weary. They will walk and not be faint"(NIV).
I wonder if the most important thing in my life today is waiting on God: not first and foremost to meet my needs, though I need my needs met and He will meet them in His way and time but, no, waiting on God to show me His face, to speak to my heart, to ground my soul in Him. I wonder if the holy life is not, before all else, the waiting life. "Be stil and know that I am God" Ps. 46:10 (NIV).

St. Francis of Assisi writes: "The slothful man loses both this world and the next; for he bears no fruit and he profits not another. It is impossible for a man to gain virtue without diligence and great toil. When you can abide in a safe place, do not stand in a perilous place: he abides in a safe place who strives and suffers and works and toils through God, and for the Lord God, not through fear or punishment or for a price, but for love of God . . ."

Lloyd John Ogilvie writes; "At the heart of the kingdom of heaven is the King's heart of forgiveness . . . Our sin is rebellion against God: the willful desire to run our own lives, to shape our own destiny, to live by our own strength and grit. How can we repay the debt we owe for the ravage we make of our lives? We can't . . . And lo! The King responds to our plea. He sends His only Son,jesus, to save His people from their sins."
Heavenly Father, I sing the words once again of the great chorus that I learned long ago and that I have sang so often since - though not nearly often enough: 'Thank you, Lord, for saving my soul. Thank you, Lord, for making me whole. Thank you, Lord, for giving to me - Thy great salvation so full and free.' Father help me to remember today that without Jesus Christ I am actually and in fact lost - eternally lost - and without hope. Help me, Father, not only to remember this fact today - help me, through the power of Your Holy Spirit, to live it. In Jesus' Name, Amen.

In his A TESTAMENT TO FREEDOM Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes: "If I am one who says where God shall be, so I will always find a God there who corresponds in some way to me, is pleasing to me, who belongs to my nature. If it is, however, God who speaks where God chooses to be, then that will probably be a place which does not at all correspond to my nature, which is not at all pleasing to me. But this place is the cross of Christ. And the one who will find him there must be with him under this cross, just as the Sermon on the Mount demands. This doesn't suit our nature at all but is completely counter to it. This, however, is the message of the Bible, not only in the New but also in the Old Testament (Is. 53). In any event, Jesus and Paul intended this: with the cross of Jesus is the Scripture, that is, the Old Testament, fulfilled. The whole Bible will, therefore, be the Word in which God will allow the divine self to be discovered by us. This is no place which is pleasing or sensible to us, but a place strange to us in every way and which is entirely contrary to us. But this is the very place God has chosen to encounter us."
Heavenly Father, its Monday morning and my back hurts and I need to walk and I would like to read in the paper about my baseball team winning yesterday - they don't win very often - and breakfast sounds good and I think that I need to do this and certainly that. Please remind me that what I really need and must have at the beginning of this - and every new day - is a fresh, and new, and clearer vision of Jesus than I've ever had before. I need to know in what part of me the Potter is going to be working today. And I need to be reminded that, whatever You do to or for or with me, Your grace is sufficient. Please remind me that this will only occur as I 'get into Your Word and allow Your Word to get into me.' Right now, Father, as I begin reading in Galations, help me to be still and know that you are God. In Jesus' name. Amen

If the Lord is to be Lord, worship must have a priority in our lives. The first commandment of Jesus is, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength" (Mark 12:30). The divine priority is worship first, service second. Our lives are to be punctuated with praise, thanksgiving, and adoration. Service flows out of worship. Service as a substitute for worship is idolatry. Activity is the enemy of adoration.
The primary function of the Levitical priests was to "come near to minister to me" (Ezek. 44:15). For the Old Testament priesthood, ministry to God was to precede all other work. And that is no less true of the universal priesthood of the New Testament. One grave temptation we all face is to run around answering calls to service without ministering to the Lord himself.
Today God is calling his Church back to worship. This can be seen in high church circles where there is a renewed interest in intimacy with God. It can be seen in low church circles where there is a new interest in liturgy. It can be seen everywhere in between these two. It is as if God is saying, "I want the hearts of my people back!" And if we long to go where God is going and do what God is doing, we will move into deeper, more autentic worship. Richard J. Foster

"The mercy of heaven is big enough to take in all our sinful race. The blood of Christ is rich enough to cover the guilt of every child of Adam. The gospel is broad enough to take in whosoever will. The life of Christ is full enough to save and sanctify and keep all the myriads of our race, if they will but accept it. The heaven that He has provided is vast enough for all earth's lost generations. And the divine plan is grand enough to take in every kindred and tribe and tongue, all earth's countless inhabitants . . . there is no limitation to the sufficiency of Christ's redemption and universal and all-embracing fullness of the gospel of salvation." Rev. A. B. Simpson

Great preaching from the eighteenth century evangelist, George Whitefield: "Many of you, perhaps, are not (spiritually) hungry. What say you, my dear friends? I would put the question to you once more, 'Will you taste of Christ's supper, or will you not?' You shall all be welcome. There is milk at this feast for babes as well as meat for young people and for persons of riper years. There is room and provision for high and low, rich and poor, one with another. Our Savior will thank you for coming. Astonishing love! The thought of it quite overcomes me. Help me, help me, believers, to bless and praise Him.
And that this love may excite us to come afresh to Him as we had never come before! For though we have been often feasted, yet our souls will starve unless we renew our a acts of faith and know ourselves as lost, undone sinners continually at the feet of Christ. Feeding upon past experiences will not satisfy our souls any more than what we did eat yesterday will sustain our bodies today. No, believers must look for fresh influences of divine grace and beg of the Lord to water them every moment. Come you to the marrriage feast. You are as welcome now as ever. And may God set your souls longing for that time when we shall sit down and eat bread in the kingdom of heaven! There we shall have full measure of divine love and enjoy the glorious Emmanuel forevermore." GOOD STUFF!!!

Oswald Chambers writes: "The tiniest thing we allow in our lives that is not under the control of the Holy Spirit is quite sufficient to account for spiritual muddle, and all the thinking we like to spend on it will never make it clear. Spiritual muddle is only made plain by obedience. Immediately we obey, we discern. . . When the natural power of vision is devoted to the Holy Spirit, it becomes the power of perceiving God's will and the whole life is kept in simplicity."
Heavenly Father, as the prevailing principle of Christ's life while on earth was to do "exactly" what you commanded Him to do(John 14:31 NIV), I seek and wait for Your Spirit to make this the prevailing principle of my life as well. Obedience, except to my own, human, sinful desires is not natural to me - nor will it happen unless,Father,You make me to want to be simply Yours. In Jesus' name.

In the process of counseling a young Christian who, to their surprise, had begun to feel some unchristlike stirrings that they thought they had already dealt with, Francois Fenelon shares this wisdom; "So do not be surprised at again finding yourself becoming sensitive, impatient, haughty, and self-willed. You must be made to understand that this is your natural disposition, and without God's grace, you will never be anything different. "We must bear the yoke of the daily confusion of our sins," says St. Augustine. We must be made to feel our weakness, our wretchedness, our inability to correct ourselveds. We must give up hope in ourselves, and have no hope but in God. . . We need to understand what kind of people we really are while waiting for God to change us. We need to become humble under His all-powerful hand. We need to become submissive and manageable as soon as we sense any resistance in our will. Be silent as much as you can. Be in no hurry to judge, but think through your decisions, your likes and dislikes. In your daily living, stop at once when you are aware that you are getting in too much of a hurry. And do not be too eager even for good things. Take your time."

A great prayer from John Donne, Church of England minister and dean of St. Paul's cathedral in London, who lived in the late 16th and early 17th centuries and who wrote,among other writings, the famous sermon: 'FOR WHOM THE BELL TOLLS - it tolls for thee': "O eternal and most gracious God, who gave manna to your servants in the wilderness, bread so conditioned, qualified so, as that to every man manna tasted like that which that man like best, I humnbly beseech you to make this correction, which I acknowledge to be part of my daily bread - THAT IT WOULD TASTE SO TO ME, NOT AS I WOULD BUT AS YOU WOULD HAVE IT TASTE, AND TO CONFORM MY TASTE, AND MAKE IT AGREEABLE TO YOUR WILL. You would have your corrections taste of humiliation, but would have them taste of consolation too; taste of danger, but taste of assurance too. As therefore you have imprinted two manifest qualities in all the elements of which our bodies consist, so that as your fire dries, so it heats too; and as your water moists,so it cools too; so, O Lord, in these corrections which are the elements of our regeneration, by which our souls are made yours, imprint your two qualities, those two operations, that, as they scourge us, THEY MAY SCOURGE US INTO THE WAY TO YOU; that when they have showed us that we are nothing in ourselves, THEY MAY ALSO SHOW US, THAT YOU ARE ALL THINGS UNTO US."

Dietrich Bonhoeffer writes: 'It is true, there is something which comes between persons called by Christ and the given circmstances of their natural lives. But it is not someone unhappily contemptuous of life; it is not some law of piety. Instead, it is life and the gospel itself; it is Christ himself. In becoming human, he put himself between me and the given circumstances of the world. I cannot go back. He is in the middle. He has deprived those whom he has called of every immediate connection to those given realities. He wants to be the medium; everything should happen only through him. He stands not only between me and God, he also stands between me and the world, between me and other people and things.'
Lord Jesus, are you my medium? Does everything in my life happen only 'through you?' Can I truly say that 'every bridge is burned behind me, Thine I ever more shall be?' When something happens to me or mine is my first reaction: 'What am I going to do about this?' Or is it: 'Show me, Lord, what you are about.' In truth, Lord, do I define you by me or me by you? Christ, only you can make yourself to be to me what you must be to me - my Lord. Help me to learn, above all else, to wait on you. Thank you, Amen.