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When Persecution Threatens

Do not snatch the word of truth from my mouth,

for I have put my hope in your laws.

Psalm 119:43

It is well known that men do, when persecution
threatens, either altogether deny the truth, or
weakly and lukewarmly confess it; but lest this
should happen to him,

David therefore prays here,
” O Lord, take not the word of truth utterly out
of my mouth,” i.e., make me, with an intrepid
spirit, always to confess the avowed truth boldly
and manfully.

Solomon Gesner (1559-1665)

from studylight.org commentaries

Life of the Soul

October 8, 2022 testadmin

My comfort in my suffering is this: Your promise renews my life.

Psalm 119: 50

“Thy word hath quickened me.”

It is a reviving comfort which quickeneth the soul.
Many times we seem to be dead to all spiritual operations,
our affections are damped and discouraged; but the word of
God puts life into the dead, and relieveth us in our greatest distresses.

Sorrow worketh death, but joy is the life of the
soul. Now, when dead in all sense and feeling, ” the just shall
live by faith” (Hab.ii:4), and the hope wrought in us by the
Scriptures is “a lively hope” (1Peter.i:3). Other things skin
the wound, but our sore breaketh out again, and runneth;

faith penetrateth into the inwards of a man,
doth good for the heart; and the soul reviveth
by waiting upon God, and gets life and strength.

-Thomas Manton (1620-1677)

The Treasury of David Classic Reflections of the Wisdom of the Psalms

by Charles H. Spurgeon p.245

Judgment Seat

September 13, 2022 testadmin

For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ,
that each one may receive what is due him for the things
done while in the body, whether good or bad.

2 Corinthians 5:10

They Shall Reign With Him

September 12, 2022 testadmin

… you see the sinless Son of God bearing the sin, and,
by consequence, the condemnation of his people. And
in that wondrous spectacle, you see brought to the
bar of Infinite Justice – tried, sentenced, and condemned,
in the person of their surety – all those who are in
Christ Jesus.

In Christ they were chosen – to Christ
they were betrothed – with Christ they were united –

by Christ they are saved, – and, sitting with Christ
on his throne, they shall reign with him for ever and
ever.

From No condemnation In Christ Jesus by Octavius Winslow (1808-1878)

p 8,9 First Banner of Truth edition 1991

Window To The Soul

September 10, 2022 testadmin

“

The eyes are the window to your soul.”

William Shakespeare (1564-1616)

The eye is the lamp of the body. If your eyes are good, your whole body will be full of light.

But if your eyes are bad, your whole body will be full of darkness.

If then the light within you is darkness, how great is that darkness!

Matthew 6:22, 23

“The light of the body … – The sentiment stated in the preceding verses –

the duty of fixing the affections on heavenly things – Jesus proceeds to illustrate by a reference to the “eye.”

When the eye is directed steadily toward an object, and is in health, or is single, everything is clear and plain.

If it vibrates, flies to different objects, is fixed on no one singly, or is diseased, nothing is seen clearly.

Everything is dim and confused. The man, therefore, is unsteady. The eye regulates the motion of the body. To have an object

distinctly in view is necessary in order to correct and regulate action.

Rope-dancers, that they may steady themselves, fix the eye on some object on the wall, and look steadily at that.

If they should look down on the rope or the people, they might become dizzy and fall. A man crossing a stream on a log, if he will look

across at some object steadily, will be in little danger. If he looks down on the dashing and rolling waters, he will become dizzy, and fall.

So Jesus says, in order that the conduct may be right, it is important to fix the affections on heaven.

Having the affections there – having the eye of faith single, steady, unwavering – all the conduct will be correspondent.”

Albert Barnes (1798-1870)

Barnes, Albert. “Commentary on Matthew 6:22”. “Barnes’ Notes on the Whole Bible”.

https://www.studylight.org/commentaries/bnb/matthew-6.html. 1870.

All The Real Light

September 3, 2022 testadmin

All that we spiritually know of ourselves,
all that we know of God, and of Jesus, and
his Word, we owe to the teaching of the
Holy Spirit; all the real light, sanctification,
strength and comfort we are made to possess on
our way to glory, we must ascribe to him.

Leamington, May, 1840

from the preface of “The Work of the Holy Spirit” by Octavius Winslow

Albert Schweitzer

August 31, 2022 testadmin

“To be glad instruments of God’s love in this imperfect world is the service
to which man is called.”

Dr. Albert Schweitzer ( 1875-1965)

A Large Place

August 30, 2022 testadmin

“He brought me forth also into a large place;
he delivered me because he delighted in me.”
Psalm 18:19

And what is this “large place”? What can it be
but God Himself, that infinite Being in whom
all other beings and all other streams of life terminate?

God is a large place indeed. And it was through
humiliation, through abasement,
through nothingness that David was brought into it.

Madame Guyon (1648-1717)

God’s Will For Us

August 29, 2022 testadmin

Jesus answered, “You would have no power
over me if it were not given you from above.”
John 19:11

One who was passing through deep waters of affliction
wrote to a friend: “ Is it not a glorious thing to
know that, no difference how unjust a thing may be,
or how absolutely it may seem to be from Satan, by
the time it reaches us it is God’s will for us, and
will work for good to us? For all things work together
for good to us who love God.

And even of the betrayal,
Christ said,
“The cup which my Father gave me, shall I not drink it?”

We live charmed lives if we are living in the center
of God’s will. All the attacks that Satan, through
others’ sin, can hurl against us are not only powerless
to harm us, but are turned into blessings on the way. -H.W.S.

from Streams in the Desert Volume 1 by Mrs. Charles E. Cowman – August 14^th

Powerful Delusion

August 18, 2022 jakin7

They perish because they refused to love the truth and so be saved.
2 Thessalonians 2:10b

For this reason God sends them a powerful delusion

so that they will believe the lie and so that all will be condemned who have not believed the truth but have delighted in wickedness.
2 Thessalonians 2: 11, 12

” Their sin is this: They believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness: they did not love the truth, and therefore they did not believe it;

and, because they did not believe the truth, therefore they had pleasure in unrighteousness, or in wicked actions, and were pleased with false notions.

Note, An erroneous mind and vicious life often go together and help forward one another.

Their ruin is thus expressed: God shall send them strong delusions, to believe a lie.

Thus he will punish men for their unbelief, and for their dislike of the truth and love to sin and wickedness; not that God is the author of sin, but in righteousness he sometimes withdraws his grace from such sinners as are here mentioned; he gives them over to Satan, or leaves them to be deluded by his instruments;

he gives them up to their own hearts’ lusts, and leaves them to themselves, and then sin will follow of course, yea, the worst of wickedness, that shall end at last in eternal damnation. God is just when he inflicts spiritual judgments here, and eternal punishments hereafter, upon those who have no love to the truths of the gospel,

who will not believe them, nor live suitably to them, but indulge false doctrines in their minds, and wicked practices in their lives and conversation.”

from Matthew Henry’s Commentary on 2 Thessalonians 2:11,12

But we ought always to thank God for you, brothers loved by the Lord, because from the beginning God chose you to be saved through the sanctifying work of the Spirit and through belief in the truth.
2 Thessalonians 2:13

” When we hear of the apostasy of many, it is a great comfort and joy, that there is a remnant according to the election of grace, which does and shall persevere; especially we should rejoice, if we have reason to hope that we are of that number. The preservation of the saints, is because God loved them with an everlasting love, from the beginning of the world.”

from Matthew Henry’s Commentary on 2 Thessalonians 2:13

This blog was originally posted on November 23, 2020. It bares repeating.