MAY 1
"This people hath a revolting and a rebellious heart; they are revolted and gone."—Jer 5:23
We look at a believer's lax practice, we mourn and weep over it, and we do well; we trace our own, and still deeper shame and confusion of face cover us; but we forget that the cause of our bitterest sorrow and humiliation should be the concealed principle of evil, from whence springs this unholy practice. How few among the called of God are found confessing and mourning over the sin of their nature: the impure fountain from whence flows the stream, the unmortified root from whence originates the branch, and from which both are fed and nourished. This is what God looks at, the sin of our fallen, unsanctified nature; and this is what we should look at, and mourn over. Indeed, true mortification of sin consists in a knowledge of our sinful nature, and its subjection to the power of divine grace. The reason why so few believers "through the Spirit do mortify the deeds of the body" (Rom 8:13) is a forgetfulness that the work has to do first and mainly with the root of sin in the soul. Make the
tree good, and the fruit will also be good (Matt 12:33); purify the fountain, and the streams will be pure. Oh, were there a deeper acquaintance with the hidden iniquity of our fallen nature, a more thorough learning out of the truth that in our flesh there dwelleth no good thing (Rom 7:18), a more heartfelt humiliation on account of it, and more frequent confession of it before God, how much higher than they now are would be the attainments in holiness of many believers!
There is, then, in every child of God, the innate principle of departure. Notwithstanding the wonders of grace God has wrought for the soul, and though He has elected, called, renewed, washed, and clothed the believer, yet if He did not check and rein him in, he would depart, and that forever! This unsanctified, unmortified principle would bear him away. Is there not in this aspect of our theme something truly heartbreaking? We are the subject of a kind and benevolent government, and yet always rebelling against the Sovereign; dwelling under a kind and loving Father's roof, and yet perpetually grieving Him and departing from Him; to have received so many costly proofs of His love, and yet rendering the most ungrateful returns—oh, it is enough to sink the soul in the deepest self-abasement before God.
Reader, what has the Lord been to thee? Come, witness for Him; has He ever been a wilderness to thee, a dry and barren land? Has there been anything in His dealings, in His conduct, in His way with thee, that should cause thee to have turned thy back upon Him? Has there been any harshness in His rebukes, any unkind severity in His corrections, anything judicial and vindictive in His dealings? No; on the contrary, has He not been a fruitful garden, a pleasant land, a fountain of living waters to thee? Has He not blended kindness with all His rebukes, tenderness with all His chastisements, love with all His dealings, and has not His gentleness made thee great? Then why hast thou departed from Him? What is there in God that thou shouldst leave Him, what in Jesus that thou shouldst wound Him, what in the blessed Spirit that thou shouldst grieve Him? Is not the cause of all thy departure, declension, unkindness, unfruitfulness, in thyself, and in thyself alone? But if this has been thy conduct towards God, not so has been His conduct towards thee.
MAY 2
"I will not let thee go, except thou bless me."—Gen 32:26
It is the knowledge of his need that gives true eloquence to the petition of the beggar. A sense of destitution, of absolute want, of actual starvation imparts energy to his plea, and perseverance in its attainment. His language is, "I must have bread, or I die." This is just what we want the child of God to feel. What is he but a pensioner on God's daily bounty? What resources has he within himself? None whatever; and what is he without God but poor indeed? Now, in proportion as he becomes acquainted with his real case, his utter destitution, he will besiege the throne of grace, and take no denial. He must know his wants, he must know what grace he is deficient in, what easy besetting sin clings to him, what infirmities encompass him, what portion of the Spirit's work is declining in his soul, where he is the weakest and the most exposed to the attacks of the enemy, and what he yet lacks to perfect him in all the will of God.
Let him examine himself honestly, and know his real condition. This will endear the throne of grace, will stir up the slumbering spirit of prayer, will supply him with errands to God, and give argument, energy, and perseverance to his suit. It
was his deep and pressing sense of need that imparted such boldness and power to the wrestling of Jacob. "I will not let thee go, except thou bless me"; and the Lord said, "Thy name shall be called no more Jacob, but Israel: for as a prince hast thou power with God and with men, and hast prevailed" (Gen 32:28). Thus imitate the patriarch; begin the day with thinking over what you may possibly need before its close, whether any cross is anticipated or any temptation is apprehended or any danger to which you may be exposed; and then go and wrestle for the needed and the promised grace. Oh, it is a great mercy to have an errand that sends us to God; and when we remember what a full heart of love He has, what a readiness to hear, what promptness in all His answers, what entering into the minutest circumstance of a believer's history, how it chides the reluctance and rebukes the unbelief that we perpetually manifest in availing ourselves of this most costly, holy, and precious of all our privileges!
MAY 3
"They that are whole have no need of the physician, but they that are sick: I came not to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance."—Mark 2:17
The Spirit glorifies Christ by revealing what Christ is to an emptied, lowly, penitent soul. And this He does by unfolding the great truth of the Bible that Jesus died for sinners . Not for the righteous or the worthy, but for sinners as sinners, for the unrighteous, the unworthy, the guilty, and the lost. Precious moment, when the Eternal Spirit, the great glorifier of Jesus, brings this truth with power to the heart! "I had believed," exclaims the transported soul, "that Jesus died only for those who were worthy of so rich a sacrifice, of such immense love. I thought to bring some price of merit in my hands, some self-preparation, some previous fitness, something to render my case worthy of His notice, and to propitiate His kind regard. But now I see His salvation is for the vile, the poor, the penniless. I read that 'when we were yet without strength, in due time Christ died for the ungodly' (Rom 5:6); 'that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us' (Rom 5:8); that 'when we were enemies, we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son' (Rom 5:10); that 'this is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that
Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners' (1 Tim 1:15); that it is 'without money and without price' (Isa 55:1); that it is 'by grace we are saved' Eph 2:5); and that 'it is of faith, that it might be by grace' (Rom 4:16)."
With this good news, these joyful tidings, this glorious message of free mercy for the vilest of the vile, believed, received, and welcomed, the clouds all vanish in a moment, the fogs all disappear, the face of God beams in mild and softened luster, and the jubilee of the soul is ushered in amid light and joy, gladness and praise. Oh, what glory now encircles the Redeemer! That soul venturing upon Him with but the faith of reliance, traveling to Him in all weakness, and in the face of all opposition, brings more glory to His name than all the hallelujahs of the heavenly minstrelsy ever brought.
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MAY 4
"Why are ye so fearful? how is it that ye have no faith?"—Mark 4:40
The habitual, or even the occasional, doubtful indulgence in an apprehension of his interest in Christ will tend materially to the enfeebling and decay of a believer's faith; no cause can be more certain in its effects than this. If it is true that the exercise of faith develops its strength, it is equally
true that the perpetual indulgence of doubtful apprehensions of pardon and acceptance must necessarily eat as a cankerworm at the root of faith. Every misgiving felt, every doubt cherished, every fear yielded to, every dark providence brooded over tends to unhinge the soul from God, and dims its near and loving view of Jesus. To doubt the love, the wisdom, and the faithfulness of God; to doubt the perfection of the work of Christ; to doubt the operation of the Spirit on the heart—what can tend more to the weakening and decay of this precious and costly grace? Every time the soul sinks under the pressure of a doubt of its interest in Christ, the effect must be a weakening of the soul's view of the glory, perfection, and all-sufficiency of Christ's work. But imperfectly may the doubting Christian be aware what dishonor is done to Jesus, what reflection is cast upon His great work, by every unbelieving fear he cherishes. It is a secret wounding of Jesus, however the soul might shrink from such an inference; it is a lowering, an undervaluing of Christ's obedience and death, that glorious work of salvation with which the Father has declared Himself well pleased, that work with which divine justice has confessed itself satisfied, that work, on the basis of which every poor, convinced sinner is saved, and on the ground of which millions of
redeemed and glorified spirits are now basking around the throne, that work we say is dishonored, undervalued, and slighted by every doubt and fear secretly harbored or openly expressed by a child of God. The moment a believer looks at his unworthiness more than at the righteousness of Christ and supposes that there is not a sufficiency of merit in Jesus to supply the absence of all merit in Himself before God is but a setting up his sinfulness and unworthiness above the infinite worth, fullness, and sufficiency of Christ's atonement and righteousness.
There is much forged humility among many of the dear saints of God. It is thought by some that to be always doubting one's pardon and acceptance is the evidence of a lowly spirit. It is, allow us to say, the mark of the very opposite of a lowly and humble mind. True humility credits the testimony of God, believes because He has spoken it, and rests in the blood and righteousness and all-sufficiency of Jesus because He has declared that whosoever believeth in Him shall be saved. Genuine lowliness, the blessed product of the Eternal Spirit, is to go to Jesus just as I am, a poor, lost, helpless sinner; to go without previous preparation; to go glorying in my weakness, infirmity, and poverty, that the free grace, and sovereign pleasure, and infinite merit of Christ
might be seen in my full pardon, justification, and eternal glory. There is more unmortified pride, self-righteousness, and that principle that would make God a debtor to the creature, in the refusal of a soul fully to accept of Jesus, than is suspected. There is more real, profound humility in a simple, believing venture upon Christ, as a ruined sinner, taking Him as all its righteousness, pardon, and glory than it is possible for any mortal mind to fathom. Doubt is ever the offspring of pride; humility is ever the handmaid of faith.
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MAY 5
"If we believe not, yet he abideth faithful; he cannot deny himself."—2 Tim 2:13
The only true and secure anchor for a poor soul tossed amid the waves of doubt and perplexity is to know that God cannot alter His word; that it is impossible that He should lie; that were He to deviate from His infinite perfection, He would cease to be a perfect being, and consequently would cease to be God; to know, too, that He is faithful in the midst of the unfaithfulness and perpetual deviations of His child, faithful in the depth of the deepest affliction, faithful when earthly hopes wither, and human cisterns are broken, and when the soul is led to exclaim, "His faithfulness hath failed!" Oh, what a spring to a
tried and drooping faith is this view which God Himself has given of His own glorious and perfect character!
It is no small triumph of faith to walk with God, when all is darkness with the soul, and there is no light; to feel amid the roaring of the waves that still He is faithful; that though He slay, yet the soul can trust Him; that though He were to take all else away He would never remove Himself from His people. Oh, glorious triumph of faith! "Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of his servant, that walketh in darkness, and hath no light? let him trust in the name of the Lord, and stay upon his God" (Isa 50:10).
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MAY 6
"Ye did run well; who did hinder you that ye should not obey the truth?"—Gal 5:7
The apostle Paul, skillful to detect and faithful to reprove any declension in the faith or laxity in the practice of the early churches, discovered in that of Galatia a departure from the purity of the truth, and a consequent carelessness in their walk. Grieved at the discovery, he addresses to them an affectionate and faithful Epistle, expressive of his astonishment and pain, and proposing a solemn and searching inquiry. "I marvel," he writes, "that
ye are so soon removed from him that called you into the grace of Christ" (Gal 1:6). "But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements" (Gal 4:9)? "I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain" (Gal 4:11). "Where is then the blessedness ye spake of" (Gal 4:15)? "I stand in doubt of you" (Gal 4:20). "Ye did run well; who did hinder you" (Gal 5:7)? To the reader conscious of secret declension in his soul, we propose the same searching and tender inquiry. Ye did run well; who did hinder you? What stumbling block has fallen in your way? What has impeded your onward course? What has enfeebled your faith, chilled your love, drawn your heart from Jesus, and lured you back to the weak and beggarly elements of a poor world? You set out fair; for a time you did run well; your zeal, and love, and humility gave promise of a useful life, of a glorious race, and of a successful competition for the prize; but something has hindered. What is it? Is it the world, creature love, covetousness, ambition, presumptuous sin, unmortified corruption, the old leaven unpurged?
Search it out. Rest not until it is discovered. Your declension is secret; perhaps the cause is secret—some spiritual duty secretly neglected, or some known sin secretly indulged. Search it out,
and bring it to light. It must be a cause adequate to the production of effects so serious. You are not as you once were. Your soul has lost ground; the divine life has declined; the fruit of the Spirit has withered; the heart has lost its softness, the conscience its tenderness, the mind its lowliness, the throne of grace its sweetness, the cross of Jesus its attraction. Oh, how sad and melancholy the change that has passed over you! And have you not the consciousness of it in your soul? Where is the blessedness you spoke of? Where is the sunlight countenance of a reconciled Father? Where are the rich moments spent before the cross? The hallowed seasons of communion in the closet, shut in with God? Where is the voice of the turtledove, the singing of birds, the green pastures where thou didst feed, the still waters on whose banks thou didst repose? Is it all gone? Is it winter with thy soul? Ah, yes; thy soul is made to feel that it is an evil and a bitter thing to depart from the living God.
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MAY 7
"For I know that in me (that is, in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing."—Rom 7:18
The Lord will cause His people to know their perfect weakness and insufficiency to keep themselves, and that, too, not notionally, not
theoretically, nor from what they hear or from what they read, but from their own deep personal experience of the truth. He is perpetually causing them to learn it. I do not allude merely to that blessed period when the Holy Ghost first lays His axe at the fabric of their self-righteousness—truly they must first learn it then—but it is a truth with which they become growingly acquainted. It is a lesson they are made daily to learn; and he becomes the most perfectly schooled in it who watches most narrowly his own heart, is most observant of his own way, and deals most constantly and simply with the cross of Jesus.
With regard to the way which the Lord adopts to bring them into the knowledge of it, it is varied. Sometimes it is by bringing them into great straits and difficulties, hedging up their path with thorns, or paving it with flints. Sometimes it is in deep adversity after great prosperity, as in the case of Job, stripped of all, and laid in dust and ashes, in order to be brought to the conviction and the confession of deep and utter vileness. Sometimes it is in circumstances of absolute prosperity, when He gives the heart its desire, but sends leanness into the soul. Oh, how does this teach a godly man his own utter nothingness! Sometimes it is by permitting the messenger of Satan to buffet, sending and perpetuating some heavy, lingering,
lacerating cross. Sometimes by the removal of some beloved prop, on which we too fondly and securely leaned, putting a worm at the root of our pleasant spreading gourd, drying up our refreshing spring, or leading us down deep into the valley of self-abasement and humiliation. But the great school in which we learn this painful yet needed and wholesome lesson is in the body of sin which we daily bear about with us. It was here Paul learned his lesson, as the seventh chapter of his letter to the church at Rome shows, and for which Epistle the saints of God will ever have reason to praise and adore the blessed and eternal Spirit. In this school and in this way did the great apostle of the Gentiles learn that the most holy, deeply taught, useful, privileged, and even inspired saint of God was in himself nothing but the most perfect weakness and sin.
Be not thou cast down, dear reader, if the Lord the Spirit is teaching you the same lesson in the same way; if He is now plowing up the hidden evil, breaking up the fallow ground, discovering to you more of the evil principle of your heart, the iniquity of your fallen nature, and that, too, it may be, at a time of deep trial, of heavy, heartbreaking affliction. Ah! Thou art ready to exclaim, "All these things are against me. Am I a child of God? Can I be a subject of grace, and at the same
time be the subject of so much hidden evil, and of such deep, overwhelming trial? Is this the way He dealeth with His people?"
Yes, dear believer, thou art neither solitary nor alone; for along this path all the covenant people of God are traveling to their better and brighter home. Here they become acquainted with their own weakness, their perpetual liability to fall; here they renounce their former thoughts of self-power and of self-keeping; and here, too, they learn more of Jesus as their strength, their all-sufficient keeper, more of Him as their "wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption." Cheer up then, for the Lord thy God is leading thee on by a safe and a right way to bring thee to a city of rest.
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MAY 8
"That the trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold that perisheth, though it be tried with fire, might be found unto praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ."—1 Pet 1:7
The trial of faith is a test of its character; it is the furnace that tries the ore to see what kind it is. It may be brass or iron or clay, or perhaps precious gold; but the crucible will test it. There is much that passes for real faith that is no faith; there is
much spurious, counterfeit metal; it is the trial that brings out its real character. The true character of Judas was not known until his covetousness was tempted. Simon Magus was not discovered to possess a spurious faith, until he thought to purchase the gift of God with money. Demas did not forsake the apostle, until the world drew him away. But true faith stands the trial. Where there is a real work of grace in the heart, no tribulation, persecution, or power of this world will ever be able to expel it thence; but if all is chaff, the wind will scatter it; if all is but dross and tinsel, the fire will consume it.
Let the humble and tried believer, then, thank God for every test that brings out the real character of his faith, and proves it to be "the faith of God's elect." God will try His own work in the gracious soul. Every grace of His own Spirit he will at one time or another place in the crucible, but never will He remove His eye from off it. He will "sit as a refiner," and watch that not a grain of the precious metal is consumed. He will be with His child in all and every affliction; not for one moment will He leave him. Let gratitude rather than murmuring, joy rather than sorrow, attend every test which a loving and faithful Father brings to His own gracious work—"that the trial of your faith...might be found unto
praise and honour and glory at the appearing of Jesus Christ" (1 Pet 1:7).
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MAY 9
"No man hath seen God at any time; the only begotten Son, which is in the bosom of the Father, he hath declared him."—John 1:18
Of the spirituality of the divine nature we can form no just or definite conception. All our ideas of it must necessarily be unintelligible, vague, and shadowy. Referring to this impossibility, and in language of condescending adaptation to our sensible view of objects, Jesus says of His Father, "Ye have neither heard his voice at any time, nor seen his shape" (John 5:37). Ignorant of this inspired truth, and yet with a quenchless thirst ever desiring such a conception of an infinite spirit as would afford a resting place for the mind, an object on which faith could repose, and around which the affections could entwine, man has been beguiled into atheism and idolatry of the most debasing and fearful character. Framing his conceptions of spirit after his own low and depraved idea of matter, he has "changed the glory of the uncorruptible God into an image made like to corruptible man, and to birds, and fourfooted beasts, and creeping things" (Rom 1:23). But God has revealed Himself. He has stooped to our
nature, and in the person of His incarnate Son has embodied the spirituality of His being, with all its divine and glorious attributes.
All that we clearly, savingly know of God is just the measure of our acquaintance with this truth. Jesus brings God near. "Thou art near, O Lord" (Ps 119:151). Oh, how near! "They shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us" (Matt 1:23). The most stupendous, glorious truth which a created mind ever grasped is involved in this wondrous declaration, "Emmanuel, God with us." With what glory does it invest the Bible! What a foundation does it lay for faith! What substance does it impart to salvation! And what a good hope does it place before the believing soul! God is with us in Christ, with us in the character of a reconciled Father, with us every step of our journey to heaven, with us to guide in perplexity, soothe in sorrow, comfort in bereavement, rescue in danger, shield in temptation, provide in want, support in death, and safely conduct to glory. My soul, fall prostrate in the dust before the majesty of this amazing, precious truth; adore the wisdom that has revealed it, and admire the grace that makes it thine!
MAY 10
"Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth."—Col 3:2
How solemn and full of meaning are these words! To set the affections on heavenly things is to realize the ardent desire of the apostle: that he might "know him and the power of his resurrection" (Phil 3:10). Oh, there is a mighty, elevating power in the resurrection of Christ! It is the great lever of a child of God, lifting him above earth, heavenward. To know that he is closely and inseparably one with the risen Head of the church is to be the subject of a continuous, quickening influence, which in spirit raises him from the dust and darkness and pollutions by which he is surrounded, fixing the affections with greater ardency of devotion and supreme attachment on things above. Nothing will more sanctify and elevate our hearts than to have them brought under the power of Christ's resurrection. Following Him by faith, from the dust of earth to the glory of heaven, the affections will ascend with their Beloved. Where He is, the heart's most precious treasure, there it will be also. And oh, to have the heart with Christ in heaven, what an unspeakable mercy! And why should it not be? Has earth more that is attractive and lovely, holy and worthy of its affection, than heaven?
Here, we are encircled by, and combat with, spirits of darkness and pollution, principalities and powers; there, is "an innumerable company of angels." Here, we are much separated from the Church of God; there, is the "general assembly and church of the firstborn" (Heb 12:23), from whom nothing shall divide us. Here, the divine presence is often withdrawn, and we are taunted and accused by our foes; there, is "God the Judge of all," whose presence will be our eternal glory, and who will "bring forth thy righteousness as the light, and thy judgment as the noonday" (Ps 37:6). Here, we often hang our heads in sorrow, at the imperfections we mark in the saints; there are the "spirits of just men made perfect," "without fault before the throne." Here, we often lose sight of our beloved Lord; there, is "Jesus the mediator of the new covenant" (Heb 12:24), never more to be veiled from our view. Oh, then, how much richer and more attractive is heaven than earth to a renewed and holy mind, each moment growing richer and more attractive by the accession to its happiness of those, the holy and loved ones of the earth, who have for a little while preceded us to that world of perfect bliss! Our treasure in glory, how rapidly it accumulates! Death, which impoverishes us here by snatching from our embrace the objects of our love, by that
same act augments our riches in heaven, into the full possession and enjoyment of which it will, in its appointed time, beneficently translate us.
But the sweetest, the most powerful attraction of heaven, let us never forget, is, that Jesus is there. What would heaven be, were He absent? Could we, at this moment, rush into the fond embrace of the dearest of the glorified ones, and meet not the "Chief among ten thousand," the altogether lovely One, who on earth was more precious to our hearts than life itself? Oh, how soon would its glory fade from our eye, and its music pall upon our ear! It would cease to be heaven without Christ. Even on earth His presence and His smile constitute the first dawning of that better world. He who lives most in the enjoyment of this—and oh, how much more may be enjoyed than we have the faintest conception of—has most of the element of heaven in his soul. Aim, then, to cultivate heavenly affections, by a life of high communion with God.
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MAY 11
"Being confident of this very thing, that he, which hath begun a good work in you, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ."—Phil 1:6
The doctrine of the Spirit's personal dignity affords a pledge that the work thus commenced
shall be carried forward to a final and glorious completion. Because He is God, He will finish what He has begun. And let it not be forgotten that the growth of the believer in the experience of the truth is as much the work of the eternal Spirit as was the first production of divine life in the soul. The dependence of the believer on the Spirit by no means ceases in conversion. There are stages afterward which it is his office to conduct the believing soul. Deeper views of sin's exceeding sinfulness, a more thorough knowledge of self, more enlarged discoveries of Christ, a more simple and habitual resting upon His finished work, increasing conformity to the divine image, the daily victory over indwelling sin, and a constant preparation for the inheritance of the saints in light—all these work the one and the same Spirit who first breathed into his soul the breath of spiritual life.
The believer cannot advance one step without the Spirit; not a victory can he achieve without the Spirit; not a moment can he exist without the Spirit. As he needed Him at the first, so he needs Him all his journey through. And so he will have Him until the soul passes over Jordan. To the last ebbing of life, the blessed Spirit will be his Teacher, his Comforter, and his Guide. To the last, He will testify of Jesus; to the last, He will apply the atoning blood; and to the very entrance of the
happy saint into glory, the eternal Spirit of God, faithful, loving to the last, will be present to whisper words of pardon, assurance, and peace. Holy Spirit, build us up in the infinite dignity of Thy person, and in the surpassing greatness and glory of Thy work!
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MAY 12
"In whom also, after that ye believed, ye were sealed with that Holy Spirit of promise."—Eph 1:13
Although it is most true that the moment a sinner believes in Jesus he becomes actually an "heir of God" and a joint heir with Christ (Rom 8:17), and enters into the family as an adopted child, yet the clear and undoubted sense of this vast mercy may not be sealed upon his heart until years later. He may long have walked without the sweet sense of God's adopting love in his heart, and the frame of his spirit and language of his soul in prayer has been more that of the "son of the bondwoman" than the "son of the freewoman"; he has known but little of the "free spirit," the spirit of an adopted child, and he has seldom gone to God as a kind, loving, tender, and faithful Father. But now the divine Sealer, the eternal Spirit of God, enters afresh, and impresses deeply upon his soul the unutterably
sweet and abiding sense of his adoption. Oh, what an impression is then left upon his heart, when all his legal fears are calmed, all his slavish moanings are hushed, all his bondage spirit is gone, and when, under the drawings of filial love, he approaches the throne of grace, and cries, "My Father!" and his Father responds, "My child!" "Thou shalt call me, My Father; and shalt not turn away from me" (Jer 3:19).
The sealing of the Spirit does not always imply a rejoicing frame. It is not necessarily accompanied by great spiritual joy. While we cannot forget that it is the believer's privilege to be "always rejoicing," "rejoicing evermore," and that a state of spiritual joy is as holy a state as it is happy, yet we cannot suppose that the "sealed" are always in possession of this "fruit of the Spirit." It is perhaps more a state of rest in God, a state of holy quietude and peace, which, in many cases, seldom rises to that of joy. There is an unclouded hope, a firm and unshaken resting on the finished work, a humble reliance on the stability of the covenant and the immutability of God's love, which is never moved even when there is no sensible enjoyment, and when comfort seems to die. It is a state corresponding to that which David thus expresses: "Although my house be not so with God; yet he hath made with me an everlasting
covenant, ordered in all things and sure: for this is all my salvation, and all my desire, although he make it not to grow" (2 Sam 23:5). Perhaps it is more akin to Job's frame of soul when he exclaimed, "Though he slay me, yet will I trust in him" (Job 13:15). Sensible comforts may be withdrawn, joy may be absent, the Sun of Righteousness casting but a faint twilight over the soul, and yet, such is the power of faith grasping the cross of Christ; such the firm resting of the soul upon the stability of the covenant; upon what God is, and upon what He has promised; that, without one note of joy, or one ray of light, the believer can yet say, "I know whom I have believed" (2 Tim 1:12). And why, we ask, this strong and vigorous reliance? Why buoying up of the soul in the absence of sensible comfort? We reply, "Because that soul has attained unto the sealing of the Spirit." This forms the great secret.
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MAY 13
"The Holy Spirit of God, whereby ye are sealed unto the day of redemption."—Eph 4:30
The believer will never lose the sealing of the Spirit. The impression of God's pardoning love, made in the heart by the Holy Ghost, is never entirely effaced. We do not say that there are never moments when the "consolations of God
are small" with the believer; when he shall have no severe "fightings within, and fears without"; when the experience of the church shall be his, "I opened to my beloved; but my beloved had withdrawn himself, and was gone: my soul failed when he spake: I sought him, but I could not find him; I called him, but he gave me no answer" (Song 5:6). All this he may experience, and still not lose the sealing of the Spirit. In the midst of it all, yea, in the lowest depth, there shall be the abiding conviction of an interest in God's love that sustains, animates, and comforts. It will be seen, by recurring to the state of the church above alluded to, that, although there was the consciousness of her beloved's withdrawal—though he was gone, and she sought him but could not find him, called him but he gave her no answer—yet not for one moment did she lose the impression that He was still her beloved. Here was the glorious triumph of faith, in the hour when all was loneliness, desolation, and joylessness. Here was the sealing of the Spirit which never left her, even though her "beloved had gone." And while not a beam of His beauty glanced upon her soul, nor a note of His voice fell upon her ear, she still could look up and exclaim, "I am my beloved's, and my beloved is mine" (Song 6:3).
Oh, mighty power of faith, that can anchor the soul firm on Jesus, in the darkest and wildest tempest! And this is but the sealing of the Spirit. It is the Holy Ghost so deeply impressing on the heart a sense of pardoning love, so firmly establishing it in the faithfulness of God, the finished work of Christ, the stability of the covenant, and the soul's adoption into the one family, that in the gloomiest hour, and under the most trying dispensation, there is that which keeps the soul steady to its center, even Jehovah-Jesus. And even should his sun go down behind a mist, he has the sustaining assurance that it will rise upon another world, in peerless, cloudless splendor.
The sealing of the Spirit is a permanent, abiding impression. It is "unto the day of redemption," the day when there shall be no more conflict, no more darkness, no more sin. It is not to the day of pardon, for he cannot be more entirely pardoned than he is; it is not to the day of acceptance, for he cannot be more fully accepted than now—it is to the glorious "day of redemption," the day of complete emancipation, longed for by the sons of God, and even sighed for by the "whole creation": "And not only they, but ourselves also, which have the first fruits of the Spirit, even we ourselves groan within ourselves,
waiting for the adoption, to wit, the redemption of our body" (Rom 8:23).
Oh, shout for joy, ye sealed of the Lord! Ye tried and afflicted, tossed with tempest, and not comforted; ye who find the wilderness to be but a wilderness, a vale of tears; the way rougher and rougher, narrower and narrower. Lift up your heads with joy, the hour of "your redemption draweth nigh," and the "days of thy mourning shall be ended" (Isa 60:20). And this is your security: a faithful, covenant-keeping God, "who hath also sealed us, and given the earnest of the Spirit in our hearts" (2 Cor 1:22).
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MAY 14
"And suddenly, when they had looked round about, they saw no man any more, save Jesus only with themselves."—Mark 9:8
It is possible, my dear reader, that this page may be read by you at a period of painful and entire separation from all public engagements, ordinances, and privileges. The way which it has pleased God to take thus to set you aside may be painful and humbling. The inmate of a sick chamber, or curtained within the house of mourning, or removed far from the sanctuary of God and the fellowship of the saints, you are, perhaps,
led to inquire, "Lord, why this?" He replies, "Come ye apart, and rest awhile."
Oh, the thoughtfulness, discrimination, and tenderness of Jesus towards His people! He has set you apart from public for private duties, from communion with others for communion with Himself. Ministers, friends, privileges are withdrawn, and you are, oh, enviable state, alone with Jesus.
And now expect the richest and holiest blessing of your life! Is it sickness? Jesus will make all thy bed in thy sickness, and thy experience shall be, "His left hand is under my head, and his right hand doth embrace me" (Song 2:6). Is it bereavement? Jesus will soothe thy sorrow and sweeten thy loneliness; for He loves to visit the house of mourning, and to accompany us to the grave, to weep with us there. Is it exile from the house of God, from the ordinances of the church, from a pastor's care, from Christian fellowship? Still it is Jesus who speaks, "yet will I be to them as a little sanctuary" (Ezek 11:16).
The very circumstances, new and peculiar as they are, in which you are placed, God can convert into new and peculiar mercies, yea, into the richest means of grace with which your soul was ever fed. The very void you feel, the very want you deplore, may be God's way of satiating you with His goodness. Does not God see thy grace in thy very desire for grace?
Does He not mark thy sanctification in thy very thirsting for holiness? And can He not turn that desire, and convert that thirst, into the very blessing itself? Truly He can, and often does. As one has remarked, God knows how to give the comfort of an ordinance in the want of an ordinance. And He can now more than supply the absence of others by the presence of Himself.
Oh, who can compute the blessings which now may flow into your soul from this season of exile and of solitude? Solitude! No, it is not solitude. Never were you less alone than now. You are alone with God, and He is infinitely better than health, wealth, friends, ministers, or sanctuary, for He is the substance and the sweetness of all. You have perhaps been laboring and watching for the souls of others; the Lord is now showing His tender care for yours. And oh, if while thus alone with Jesus you are led more deeply to search out the plague of your own heart, and the love of His—to gather up the trailing garment, to burnish the rusted armor, to trim the glimmering lamp, and to cultivate a closer fellowship with thy Father—how ever much you may mourn the necessity and the cause, you yet will not regret that the Lord hath set you apart from others, that you might rest awhile in His blest embrace, alone with Jesus.
MAY 15
"The throne of grace."—Heb 4:16
Forget not, dear reader, it is the throne of grace to which you come in prayer. It is a throne , because God is a Sovereign. He will ever have the suppliant recognize this perfection of His nature. He hears and answers as a Sovereign. He hears whom He will, and answers what and when He will. There must be no dictation to God, no refusing to bow to His sovereignty, no rebelling against His will. If the answer be delayed, or God should seem to withhold it altogether, remember that "He giveth not account of any of his matters" (Job 33:13) and that He has a right to answer or not to answer as seems good in His sight. Glorious perfection of God, beaming from the mercy seat!
But it is also a throne of grace . And why? Because a God of grace sits upon it, and the scepter of grace is held out from it, and all the favors bestowed there are the blessings of grace. We are the poor, the needy, the helpless, the vile, the sinful, the unworthy. We have nothing to bring but our deep wretchedness and poverty—nothing but our complaints, our miseries, our crosses, our groanings, our sighs, and tears. But it is the throne of grace. For just such is it erected. It is set up in a world of woe, in the midst of the wilderness, in
the very land of the enemy, and in the vale of tears because it is the throne of grace. It is a God of grace who sits upon it, and all the blessings He dispenses from it are the bestowments of grace. Pardon, justification, adoption, peace, comfort, light, direction—all is of grace. No worth or worthiness in the creature draws it forth; no price he may bring purchases it; no tears or complaints or misery moves the heart of God to compassion; all is of grace. God is so full of compassion and love and mercy, He needs not to be moved to pour it forth. It gushes from His heart as from a full and overflowing fountain, and flows into the bosom of the poor, lowly, humble, and contrite; enriching, comforting, and sanctifying their souls.
Then, dear reader, whatever be your case, you may come. If it is a throne of grace, as it is, then why not you? Why stand afar off? If the poor, the penniless, the disconsolate, the guilty are welcome here, and if this throne is crowded by such, why make yourself an exception? Why not come, too? What is your case, what is your sorrow, what is your burden? Perhaps you can disclose it to no earthly ear. You can tell it to God only. Then take it to Him. Let me tell thee for thine encouragement, God has His secret audience chamber, where He will meet thee alone, and where no eye shall see thee, and no ear shall hear thee, but His; where thou mayest open all thy heart, and
disclose thy real case, and pour all thy secrets into His ear. Precious encouragement! It comes from those lips into which grace was poured. "But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly" (Matt 6:6). Then, upon this promise, go to the throne of grace. Whatever be the want, temporal or spiritual, take it there. God loves your secrets. He delights in your confidence, and will honor the soul that thus honors Him.
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MAY 16
"For we are saved by hope."—Rom 8:24
The phrase, as employed by the apostle, does not imply the instrument by which we are saved, but the condition in which we are saved. The condition of the renewed creature is one of hope. Salvation by the atonement of Christ, with faith and not hope being the instrument of its appropriation, is a complete and finished thing. We cannot give this truth too great a prominence, nor enforce it with an earnestness too intense. We cannot keep our eye too exclusively or too intently fixed on Jesus. All salvation is in Him, all salvation proceeds from Him, all salvation leads to Him, and for the assurance and comfort of
our salvation we are to repose believingly and entirely on Him. Christ must be all: Christ the beginning, Christ the center, and Christ the end. Oh, blessed truth to you who sigh and mourn over the unveiled abominations that crown and darken the chamber of imagery! Oh, sweet truth to you who are sensible of your poverty, vileness, and insufficiency, and of the ten thousand flaws and failures of which, perhaps, no one is cognizant but God and your own soul! Oh, to turn and rest in Christ—a full Christ, a loving Christ, a tender Christ, whose heart's love never chills, from whose eye darts no reproof, from whose lips breathes no sentence of condemnation!
But, as it regards the complete effects of this salvation in them that are saved, it is yet future. It is the "hope which is laid up for you in heaven" (Col 1:5). It would seem utterly incompatible with the present economy that the renewed creature should be in any other condition than one of hopeful expectation. The constitution towards which he tends, the holiness for which he looks, the bliss for which he pants, and the dignity to which he aspires, could not for a moment exist in the atmosphere by which he is here begirt. His state must of necessity be one of hope, and that hope must of necessity link us with the distant and mysterious future. The effects of Christian
hope illustrate the idea "saved by hope." It is that divine emotion which buoys up the soul amidst the conflicts, the trials, and the vicissitudes of the present life so that we are cheered and sustained, or "saved" from sinking amidst the billows, by the hope of certain deliverance and a complete redemption. "In hope of eternal life, which God, that cannot lie, promised before the world began" (Titus 1:2).
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MAY 17
"Joint-heirs with Christ."—Rom 8:17
This must be understood in a limited though still in a very enlarged sense. In its highest meaning, it touches the essential Deity of our Lord, who is the heir of all things. All worlds and all souls are His. All things were created by and for Him. Heaven is His throne, and earth is His footstool. To participation in this heirdom we cannot be admitted. Nor can there be any conjoining with Christ in the merit that purchased our redemption. Here again He is alone, no creature aiding the work or dividing the glory. But, mediatorially, in consequence of the union subsisting between Christ and His people, they become heirs with Him in all the privileges and hopes pertaining to His kingdom. Our union to the Lord Jesus brings us into the possession of vast and untold blessings.
We build our claim on the basis of His atonement. He merits all, and we possess all. All the immunities and glories of our present and reversionary inheritance flow to us through Christ. "In whom also we have obtained an inheritance" (Eph 1:11). "If a son, then an heir of God through Christ" (Gal 4:7).
We cannot lay too great stress on this truth. We possess nothing, we receive nothing, we expect nothing, but through Christ. All is given to us in consideration of a righteousness which upholds and honors the divine government. Jesus is the meritorious Recipient, and we receive only through Him. Alluding to our right to, and our possession of, our inheritance, the apostle traces both to the atonement of the Son of God: "And for this cause he is the mediator of the new testament, that by means of death, for the redemption of the transgressions that were under the first testament, they which are called might receive the promise of eternal inheritance" (Heb 9:15). Thus it is alone through the "fitness" imparted by Christ, the merit He substitutes in our behalf, and the righteousness He imputes to us that we become "partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light" (Col 1:12).
Blessed Redeemer! To what dignity and honor, to what privilege and blessing, to what hope and
glory our union with Thee has advanced us! We were fallen, and Thou hast lifted us up; we were poor, and Thou hast enriched us; we were naked, and Thou hast clothed us; we were aliens, and Thou hast made us children; we were bankrupt, and Thou hast made us heirs. We lost all from fatal union with the first Adam; we receive all, and infinitely more, by our glorious union with Thee, the second Adam. Oh, for a heart to love Thee! Oh, for grace to glorify Thee! Be Thou increasingly precious to us, and may we be increasingly devoted to Thee.
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MAY 18
"Thou shalt love the Lord thy God with all thy heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy mind. This is the first and great commandment."—Matt 22:37-38
Love to God is spoken of in His Word as forming the primary and grand requirement of the divine law. Now, it was both infinitely wise and good in God thus to present Himself the proper and lawful object of love. We say it was wise, because, had He placed the object of supreme affection lower than Himself, it would have elevated an inferior object above Himself. Whatever other object than God is loved with a sole and supreme affection is a deifying of that object, so that it sits
in the temple of God, showing itself that it is God.
It was good, because a lesser object of affection could never have met the desires and aspirations of an immortal mind. God has so constituted man, implanting in him such a capacity for happiness, and such boundless and immortal desires for its possession, as can find their full enjoyment only in infinity itself. He never designed that the intelligent and immortal creature should sip its bliss at a lower fountain than Himself.
Then, it was infinitely wise and good in God that He should have presented Himself as the sole object of supreme love and worship to His intelligent creatures. His wisdom saw the necessity of having one center of supreme and adoring affection, and one object of supreme and spiritual worship for angels and to men. His goodness suggested that that center and object should be Himself, the perfection of infinite excellence, the fountain of infinite good. As from Him went forth all the streams of life to all creatures, it was but reasonable and just that to Him should return, and in Him should center all the streams of love and obedience of all intelligent and immortal creatures. As He was the most intelligent, wise, glorious, and beneficent object in the universe, it was suitable that the first, strongest, and purest
love of the creature should soar towards Him and find its resting place in Him.
Love to God, then, forms the grand requirement and fundamental precept of the divine law. It is binding upon all intelligent beings. From it no consideration can release the creature. No plea of inability, no claim of inferior objects, and no opposition of rival interest can lessen the obligation of every creature that hath breath to love the Lord his God with all his heart, and with all his soul, and with all his mind. It grows out of the relation of the creature to God as his Creator, moral Governor, and Preserver; and as being in Himself the only object of infinite excellence, wisdom, holiness, majesty, and grace. This obligation to love God with supreme affection is binding upon the creature, irrespective of any advantage which may result to him from so loving God. It is most true that God has benevolently connected supreme happiness with supreme love, and has threatened supreme misery where supreme affection is withheld; yet, independent of any blessing that may accrue to the creature from its love to God, the infinite excellence of the divine nature and the eternal relation in which He stands to the intelligent universe render it irreversibly obligatory on every creature to love Him with a supreme, holy, and unreserved affection.
MAY 19
"Them that love God."—Rom 8:28
Surely it is no small mercy belonging to the church of Christ that, composed as it is of all people and tongues, its members as "strangers scattered abroad," its essential unity deeply obscured, and its spiritual beauty sadly disfigured by the numerous divisions which mar and weaken the body of Christ, there is yet an identity of character in all by which they are not only known to God, but are recognized by each other as members of the one family of "them that love God."
Love to God, then, is the grand distinctive feature of the true Christian and the opposite marks all the unregenerate. Harmonious as their nature, their creed, and their church may be, no love to God is their binding assimilating feature or their broad distinctive character. But the saints are those who love God. Their creeds may differ in minor shades, their ecclesiastical relations may vary in outward forms as rays of light that, the remoter their distances from the center, more widely diverge from each other. Yet in this one particular there is an essential unity of character, and a perfect assimilation of spirit. They love one God and Father; and this truth, like those sundered rays of light returning to the sun, approximate to each other, forms the great assimilating
principle by which all who hold the Head and love the same Savior are drawn to one center, and in which they all harmonize and unite. The regeneration through which they have passed has effected this great change. Once they were the children of wrath, even as others, at enmity with God. Ah, is not this a heart-affecting thought? But now they love Him. The Spirit has supplanted the old principle of enmity by the new principle of love. They love Him as revealed in Christ, and they love Him for the gift of the Revealer—the visible image of the invisible God. Who, as he has surveyed the glory and realized the preciousness of the Savior, has not felt in his bosom the kindling of a fervent love to Him who, when He had no greater gift, commended His love to us by the gift of His dear Son?
They love Him, too, in His paternal character. Standing to them in so close and endearing a relation, they address Him as a Father, they confide in Him as a Father, and they obey Him as a Father. The spirit of adoption takes captive their hearts, and they love God with a child's fervent, adoring, confiding affection. They love God, too, for all His conduct. It varies, but each variation awakens the deep and holy response of love. They love Him for the wisdom, faithfulness, and holiness of His procedure—for what He withholds, as for what He grants; when He rebukes, as when
He approves. As for His frown, they know it to be a Father's frown; as for His smile, they feel it to be a Father's smile. They love Him for the rod that disciplines, as for the scepter that governs; for the wound that bleeds, as for the balm that heals. There is nothing in God, and there is nothing from God, for which the saints do not love Him. Of one truth, the source of this feeling, let us not lose sight: "We love him because he first loved us" (1 John 4:19). Thus the motive of love to God as much springs from Him as the power to love Him.
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MAY 20
"I am he that liveth, and was dead; and, behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen."—Rev 1:18
Let the Christian reader fully believe this one truth: Jesus is alive again . That will afford to his soul greater confirmation of the veracity of God's character, the truth of His Word, and the perfection and all-sufficiency of Christ's work than all other truths beside. Is Jesus alive at the right hand of God? Then the debt is paid, and justice is satisfied. Is Jesus alive at the right hand of God? Then the Father is well pleased in the work of His Son, and He rests in His love, and rejoices over His Church with singing (Zeph 3:17). Is Jesus alive? Then every promise shall be fulfilled,
and all the blessings of the everlasting covenant shall be freely bestowed, and I, a poor worthless sinner, yet resting upon His atoning work, shall live also.
May the Holy Ghost lead you into the full belief of this glorious truth—the belief of the heart as of the judgment. It is the keystone of the temple; press it as you will, the more you lean upon it, the stronger you will find it; the more you rest upon it, the firmer will grow your hope. Only receive it in simple faith, Jesus is alive—alive for you. All you want in this vale of tears is here; all your temporal mercies are secured to you here; all your spiritual blessings are laid up for you here.
Such is the great charter, such the immense untold blessings it contains, that, come how you will, come when you will, and ask what you will, it shall be granted you of the Father because Jesus is at His right hand. Well may we take up the dauntless challenge of the apostle, "Who is he that condemneth? It is Christ that died, yea, rather, that is risen again, who is even at the right hand of God, who also maketh intercession for us" (Rom 8:34). Your salvation is complete, your heaven secure, and all victory, happiness, and glory bound up in this one great fact. Therefore, may we not again exclaim with Paul, "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, which, according to his abundant mercy hath begotten
us again unto a lively hope, by the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead" (1 Pet 1:3)?
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MAY 21
"Is there no balm in Gilead? is there no physician there?"—Jer 8:22
There is! The physician is Jesus; the balm is His own most precious blood. He binds up the broken heart; He heals the wounded spirit. All the skill, efficacy, tenderness, and acute sympathy needed for the office meet and concentrate in Him in the highest degree. Here then, disconsolate soul, bring your wounded heart. Bring it simply to Jesus. One touch of His hand will heal the wound. One whisper of His voice will hush the tempest. One drop of His blood will remove the guilt. Nothing but faith's application to Him will do for thy soul now. Thy case is beyond the skill of all other physicians. Thy wound is too deep for all other remedies. It is a question of life and death, heaven or hell. It is an emergency, a crisis, a turning point with thee. Oh, how solemn, how eventful is this moment! Eternity seems suspended upon it. All the intelligences of the universe, good spirits and bad, seem gazing upon it with intense interest.
Decide the question, by closing in immediately with Jesus. Submit to God. All things are ready. The blood is shed, the righteousness is finished,
the feast is prepared, God stands ready to pardon. He advances to meet you, His returning child, to fall upon your neck and embrace you, with the assurance of His full and free forgiveness.
Let not the simplicity of the remedy keep you back. Many stumble at this. It is but a look of faith: "Look unto me, and be ye saved" (Isa 45:22). It is but a touch, even though with a palsied hand: "And as many as touched him were made whole" (Mark 6:56). It is but a believing the broad declaration, "that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners" (1 Tim 1:15). You are not called to believe that He came to save you, but that He saves sinners. Then will you inquire, "But will He save me? How do I know that if I come I shall meet a welcome?" Our reply is, only test Him. Settle not down with the conviction that you are too far gone, too vile, too guilty, too unworthy, until you have gone and tried Him. You know not how you wound Him, how you dishonor Him and grieve the Spirit by yielding to a doubt, even the shadow of a doubt, as to the willingness and the ability of Jesus to save you, until you have gone to Him believingly and put His readiness and His skill to the test.
Let not the freeness of the remedy keep you away. This, too, is a stumbling block to many. Its very freeness holds them back. But it is "without
money, and without price." The simple meaning of this is that no worthiness on the part of the applicant, no merit of the creature, no tears, no convictions, no faith, is the ground on which the healing is bestowed. Oh no! It is all of grace—all of God's free gift, irrespective of any worth or worthiness in man. Your strong motive to come to Christ is your very sinfulness. The reason you go to Him is that your heart is broken, and that He alone can bind it up; your spirit is wounded, and that He alone can heal it; your conscience is burdened, and that He alone can lighten it; your soul is lost, and that He alone can save it. That is all you need to recommend you. It is enough for Christ that you are covered with guilt; that you have no plea that springs from yourself; that you have no money to bring in your hand, but have spent your all upon physicians, and are nothing bettered; that you have wasted your substance in riotous living, and now are insolvent; and that you really feel a drawing towards Him and a longing for Him; that you ask, you seek, you crave, you earnestly implore His compassion. This is enough for Him. His heart yearns, His love is moved, His hand is stretched out. Come and welcome to Jesus. Come!
MAY 22
"Bear ye one another's burdens, and so fulfill the law of Christ."—Gal 6:2
Thank God for an errand to Him. It may be thou hast felt no heart to pray for thyself—thou hath been sensible of no peculiar drawings to the throne for thine own soul, but thou hast gone in behalf of another; the burden, the trial, the affliction, or the immediate want of some member of God's family has pressed upon thee, and thou hast taken his case to the Lord. Thou hast borne him in thine arms to the throne of grace, and, while interceding for thy brother, the Lord has met thee and blessed thine own soul. Perhaps thou hast gone and prayed for the church, for the peace of Jerusalem, for the prosperity of Zion, that the Lord would build up her waste places and make her a joy and a praise in the whole earth; perhaps it has been to pray for your minister, that the Lord would teach him more deeply and experimentally, and anoint him more plenteously with the rich anointing and unction of the Holy Ghost; perhaps it has been to pray for Christian missions and for self-denying missionaries, that the Lord would make them eminently successful in diffusing the knowledge of a precious Savior, and in calling in His people.
Thus, while for others you have been besieging the throne of grace, and pouring out your heart before the Lord, the Lord Himself has drawn near to your own soul, and you have been made to experience the blessing that is ever attendant and the reward of intercessory prayer. Then let every event, every circumstance, every providence be a voice urging you to prayer. If you have no wants, others have; take them to the Lord. If you are borne down by no cross, smitten by no affliction, or suffering from no want, others are; for them, go and plead with your heavenly Father, and the petitions you send up to the mercy seat on their behalf may return into your own bosom freighted with rich covenant blessings. The falls, the weaknesses, the declensions of others, make them grounds for prayer. Thus, and thus only, can you expect to grow in grace, and grace to grow in you.
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MAY 23
"Above all, taking the shield of faith, wherewith ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked."—Eph 6:16
Few of the children of God are ignorant of Satan's devices. But few are exempt from the "fiery darts" of the adversary; our Lord Himself was not. Many, peculiar, and great are their temptations. They
often touch the very vitals of the gospel, go to undermine the believer's faith in the fundamentals of Christianity, and affect his own personal interest in the covenant of grace. Satan is the sworn enemy of the believer, his constant, unwearied foe. There is, too, a subtlety and malignity which does not mark the other and numerous enemies of the soul. The Holy Ghost speaks of the "depths of Satan." There are "depths" in his malice, subtlety, and sagacity which many of the beloved of the Lord are made in some degree to fathom. The Lord may allow them to go down into those "depths," just to convince them that there are depths in His wisdom, love, power, and grace that can out-fathom the "depths of Satan."
But what are some of the devices of the wicked one? What are some of his fiery darts? Sometimes he fills the mind of the believer with the most blasphemous and atheistic thoughts, threatening the utter destruction of his peace and confidence. Sometimes he takes advantage of periods of weakness, trial, and perplexity to stir up the corruptions of his nature, bringing the soul back as into captivity to the law of sin and death. Sometimes he suggests unbelieving doubts respecting his adoption, beguiling him into the belief that his professed conversion is all a delusion, that his religion is all hypocrisy, and that what he had
thought was the work of grace is but the work of nature. But by far the greatest and most widespread controversy which Satan has with the saint of God is to lead him to doubt the ability and the willingness of Christ to save a poor sinner. With the anchor of his soul removed from this truth, he is driven out upon a rough sea of doubt and anguish, and is at the mercy of every wind of doctrine and every billow of unbelief that may assail his storm-tossed bark.
But in the midst of it all, whence flow the comfort and the victory of the tempted believer? From the promise which assures him that "when the enemy shall come in like a flood, the Spirit of the Lord shall lift up a standard against him" (Isa 59:19). And what is the standard which the Spirit, the Comforter, lifts up to stem this flood? A dying, risen, ascended, exalted, and ever-living Savior. This is the standard that strikes terror into the foe; this is the gate that shuts out the flood. So the disciples proved. This is their testimony: "And the seventy returned again with joy, saying, Lord, even the devils are subject unto us through thy name" (Luke 10:17). Immanuel is that name which puts to flight every spiritual foe, and the Comforter, which is the Holy Ghost, leads the tempted soul to this name to shelter itself beneath
it, to plead it with God, and to battle with it against the enemy.
Dear reader, are you a mark against which the fiery darts of the devil are leveled? Are you sore tempted? Be not astonished as though some strange thing had happened unto you. The holiest of God's saints have suffered as you are now suffering; yea, even your blessed Lord, your Master, your Pattern, your Example, and He in whose name you shall be more than conqueror, was once assailed as you are, and by the same enemy.
Let the reflection console you that temptations only leave the traces of guilt upon the conscience, and are only regarded as sins by God, if they are yielded to. The mere suggestion of the adversary, the mere presentation of a temptation, is no sin, so long as, in the strength that is in Christ Jesus, the believer firmly and resolutely resists it. "Resist the devil, and he will flee from you" (James 4:7).
Jesus has already fought and conquered for you. He knew well what the conflict with Satan was. And He remembers, too, what it is. Lift up your head, dear tempted soul! You shall obtain the victory. The seed of the woman has bruised the serpent's head and has crushed him, never to obtain his supremacy over you again. He may harass, annoy, and distress you, but he never can
pluck you from the hollow of the hand that was pierced for you.
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MAY 24
"Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, before Abraham was, I am."—John 8:58
Dear reader, what a wondrous declaration is this! What a glorious and precious truth does it involve! Are you a believer in Jesus? Is He all your salvation, your acceptance, your hope, and desire? Then cast the anchor of your faith deeply, firmly here; thou shalt find it an eternal rock. Weak faith you may have, and doubtful faith numbers have; but here is the ground of faith, respecting which there can be neither weakness nor doubt. Is it an Almighty Savior that you want? Behold Him! "Before Abraham was, I am." Oh, what a foundation for a poor sinful worm of the dust to build upon!
What a stable truth for faith in its weakest form to deal with: to have a glorious incarnate I Am for an atoning sacrifice, an I Am for a Redeemer, an I Am for a Surety, an I Am as a Mediator between God and the soul, an I Am as an Advocate, an unceasing Intercessor at the court of heaven who is pleading each moment His own atoning merits, an I Am as the center in whom all the promises are "yea and amen," an I Am as a
"Brother born for adversity," and an I Am as "a very present help in trouble"! This is the answer which faith receives to its trembling and anxious interrogatories. Touching His faithfulness, tenderness, longsuffering, fullness, and all-sufficiency, Jesus answers, "I Am" to each and all. "Enough, Lord," replies the believer, "on this I can live, and on this I can die!"
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MAY 25
"But, grow in grace, and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ."—2 Pet 3:18
There is an idea fatal to all true sanctification, which some believers, especially those who are young in experience, are prone to entertain—that nothing is to be done in the soul after a man has believed and that the work of conversion, having taken place, is all accomplished. So far from this being the case, he has but just entered upon the work of sanctification, just started in the race, just buckled on the armor. The conflict can hardly be said to have begun when the soul is first converted. Therefore, to rest composed with the idea that the soul has nothing more to do than to accept of Christ as his salvation—that there are no corruptions to subdue; no sinful habits to cut off; no long-existing and deeply imbedded sins to mortify, root, and branch; and no high and yet
higher degrees in holiness to attain—is to form a most contracted view of the Christian life. Such a view, if persisted in, must necessarily prove detrimental to the spiritual advance of the believer.
The work of sanctification, beloved, is a great and a daily work. It commences at the very moment of our translation into the kingdom of Christ on earth, and ceases not until the moment of our translation into the kingdom of God in heaven. The notion, so fondly cherished by some, of perfect sinlessness here, is as fatal to true sanctification as it is contrary to God's word. They know but little of their own heart who do not know that sin, in the language of Owen, "not only still abides in us, but is still acting, still labouring to bring forth the deeds of the flesh"—who do not know that in their flesh there dwelleth no good thing (Rom 7:18) and that "that which is born of the flesh is flesh" (John 3:6) and will retain its fleshly nature and propensities to the very last. Let us not exult "as though I had already attained, either were already perfect" (Phil 3:12); let us not be ignorant of Satan's devices, one of which is to build us up in the belief that, in the present life, a man may cease from the work of mortification. The Lord keep the reader from cherishing so erroneous an idea.
The work of sanctification is the work of a man's life. As has been remarked, "When sin lets us alone, we may let sin alone." But when is the day and when is the hour that sin does not strive for the mastery, and in which the believer can say that he has completely slain his enemy? He may "through the Spirit, mortify the deeds of the body" (Rom 8:13), and if he does, "he shall live." But, as the heart is the natural and luxuriant soil of every obnoxious weed of sin, and another springs up as soon as one is cut down, or the same root appears again above the surface with new life and vigor, it requires a ceaseless care and vigilance, a perpetual mortification of sin in the body, until we throw off this cumbrous clay and go where sin is known no more.
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MAY 26
"For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by us."—2 Cor 1:20
It pleased a gracious and sin-pardoning God to meet our guilty and conscience-stricken parents, immediately after the fall, with the comforting and gracious promise that the "seed of the woman," His eternal Son, the everlasting Mediator, should "bruise the serpent's head." On this divine assurance of recovering and saving mercy
they rested. Believing in this, as they doubtless did, they were saved, "the firstfruits unto God and to the Lamb" (Rev 14:4). Let it be emphatically spoken that they rested not upon the bare letter of the promise, but upon its substance; not merely upon the grace promised; but upon the truth of God in the promise. The bare letter of a promise is no resting place for a believing soul; it can convey no solid consolation and support. The Jews got thus far, and no further, to whom pertained the promises. This is all that they saw in the types and promises which set forth "God's unspeakable gift." They rested in the mere letter. They saw not Christ in them; and, seeing not Christ to be their substance and glory, to them the promises of God were "made of none effect."
Now God has fulfilled His ancient promise. The word He spoke to Adam He has made good to the letter to us his posterity. It is true, the vision of grace and glory seemed for a while to tarry, but it tarried only for its appointed time. It is true, the vista was long and dreary, through which patriarchs, seers, and prophets beheld it. The star of hope was often scarcely seen in the dim distance, and frequently seemed for a moment entirely quenched in darkness. Time rolled heavily along and a period of four thousand years elapsed, but, true to His word and faithful to His promise,
"when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons" (Gal 4:4-5).
Oh, how gloriously did the truth of Jehovah shine in the person of the Babe of Bethlehem! How did it gather brightness as the holy child Jesus increased in stature and in favor with God and man! And to what meridian splendor did it blaze forth when on Calvary it united with holiness and justice to finish the great work of the church's redemption! Then "mercy and truth are met together, righteousness and peace have kissed each other" (Ps 85:10).
Jesus is the grand evidence that God is true. Faith needs and asks no more. Here, on a firm foundation, it rests. Its eye ever "looking unto Jesus," it can thread its way, often sunless and starless, through a dreary and an intricate wilderness. It can travel through trials, endure temptations, bow meekly to disappointments, bear up under cross providences, and sustain the shock of fearful conflicts by trusting in the God of the covenant, resting on His promise and oath, and implicitly believing His word because it sees in Jesus an eternal witness that God is true.
MAY 27
"He is faithful that promised."—Heb 10:23
O ye of doubting and fearful heart, looking at the waves rolling at your feet, and well nigh sinking beneath their swellings, exclaiming, "Will the Lord cast off for ever? and will he be favourable no more? Is his mercy clean gone for ever? doth his promise fail for evermore? Hath God forgotten to be gracious? hath he in anger shut up his tender mercies?" (Ps 77:7-9). Behold the glory of God's truth beaming in the face of Jesus Christ, and doubt no more. So long as Jesus lives as your Advocate, your High Priest, your Representative in the court of heaven, all is yours which the covenant promises and His mediation secures. "For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen" (2 Cor 1:20). Never will he break His oath or falsify His word or alter the thing that hath gone out of His mouth. "Heaven and earth shall pass away, but my words shall not pass away" (Matt 24:35). God says it, and let faith believe it because He says it.
So essential is it to your comfort that I would repeat the caution: in all your dealings with the divine promises, avoid a Jewish faith. Do not look at the grace of the promise, or at the thing promised, precious as both are, as much as at God in the promise. The promise is the heart of your Father
speaking; it is the faithfulness of our Father performing. Rest then not in the blessing promised, but in the veracity of Him who promises it, and then shall your faith have confidence towards God.
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MAY 28
"Old things are passed away; behold, all things are become new."—2 Cor 5:17
A believer's experience of the truth of God is no mere fancy. However severely experimental godliness may have been stigmatized by an unrenewed world as the offspring of a morbid imagination or the product of an enthusiastic mind, "he that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself" (1 John 5:10) that he has yielded the consent of his judgment and his affections to no "cunningly-devised fable."
A sense of sin, brokenness and contrition before God, faith in the atoning blood of Christ, and a sweet consciousness of pardon, acceptance, adoption, and joy in the Holy Ghost are no mere hallucinations of a disordered mind. To read one's pardon, fully, fairly written out; to look up to God as one accepted, adopted; to feel the spirit going out to Him in filial love and confidence, breathing its tender and endearing epithet, "Abba, Father;" to refer every trial, cross, and dispensation of His providence to His tender and unchangeable
love; to have one's will, naturally so rebellious and perverse, completely absorbed in His; to be as a child, simply and unreservedly yielded up to His disposal; and to live in the patient waiting for the glory that is to be revealed—oh, this is reality, sweet, blessed, solemn reality! Holy and happy is that man whose heart is not a stranger to these truths.
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MAY 29
"Cast not away therefore your confidence, which hath great recompense of reward."—Heb 10:35
There is nothing essentially omnipotent in any single grace of the Spirit. To suppose this would be to deify that grace. Although regeneration is a spiritual work, and all the graces implanted in the soul are the product of the Spirit and must necessarily be spiritual and indestructible in their nature, yet they may so decline in their power and become so enfeebled and impaired in their vigor and tendency as to be classed among the "things that are ready to die." It is preeminently so with faith; perhaps there is no part of the Spirit's work more constantly and severely assailed, and consequently more exposed to declension, than this.
Shall we look at the examples in God's word? We cite the case of Abraham, the father of the faithful; beholding him, at God's command,
binding his son upon the altar, and raising the knife for the sacrifice, we unhesitatingly exclaim, "Surely never was faith like this! Here is faith of a giant character; faith, whose sinews no trial can ever relax, whose luster no temptation can ever dim." And yet, tracing the history of the patriarch still further, we find that very giant faith now trembling and yielding under a trial far less acute and severe; he who could surrender into the hands of God the life of his promised son through whose lineal descent Jesus was to come, could not entrust that same God with his own.
We look at Job. In the commencement of his deep trial we find him justifying God; messenger follows messenger, with tidings of yet deeper woe, but not a murmur is breathed; and as the cup, now full to the brim, is placed to his lips, how sweetly sounds the voice of holy resignation! "The Lord gave, and the Lord hath taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord" (Job 1:21). "In all this did not Job sin with his lips" (Job 2:10), and yet the very faith, which thus bowed in meekness to the rod, so declined as to lead him to curse the day of his birth!
We see David, whose faith could at one time lead him out to battle with Goliath, now fleeing from a shadow, and exclaiming, "I shall now perish one day by the hand of Saul" (1 Sam 27:1).
And mark how the energy of Peter's faith declined, who at one period could walk boldly upon the tempestuous sea, and yet at another could deny his Lord, panic-stricken at the voice of a little maid. Who will say that the faith of the holiest man of God may not at one time greatly and sadly decline?
But we need not travel out of ourselves for the evidence and the illustration of this affecting truth: let every believer turn in upon himself. What, reader, is the real state of your faith? Is it as lively, vigorous, and active as it was when you first believed? Has it undergone no declension? Is the object of faith as glorious in your eye as He then was? Are you not now looking at second causes in God's dealings with you, instead of lifting your eye and fixing it on Him alone? What is your faith in prayer? Do you come boldly to the throne of grace, asking, nothing doubting? Do you take all your trials, your wants, and your infirmities to God? What is your realization of eternal things; is faith here in constant, holy exercise? Art thou living as a pilgrim and a sojourner, "choosing rather to suffer affliction with the people of God" (Heb 11:25) than float along on the summer sea of this world's enjoyments? What is the crucifying power of your faith? Does it deaden you to sin, wean you from the world, and constrain you to walk
humbly with God and near to Jesus? And when the Lord brings the cross and says, "Bear this for me" does your faith promptly and cheerfully acquiesce, "Any cross, any suffering, any sacrifice for Thee, dear Lord"? Thus may you try the nature and the degree of your faith; bring it to the touchstone of God's truth, and ascertain what its character is, and how it has suffered declension.
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MAY 30
"Whom the Lord loveth he correcteth; even as a father the son in whom he delighteth."—Prov 3:12
Hard and harsh thoughts of God will be the effect of wrong interpretations of His dealings. If for one moment we remove the eye from off the heart of God in the hour and depth of our trial, we are prepared to give heed to every dark suggestion of the adversary. The moment we look at the dispensation with a different mind and to God with an altered affection, we view the chastisement as the effect of displeasure, and the covenant God that sent it as unkind, unloving, and severe. But let faith's sharp eye pierce the clouds and darkness that surround the throne, behold the heart of God as still love, all love, and nothing but love to His afflicted, bereaved, and sorrow-stricken child, and in a moment every murmur
will be hushed, every rebellious feeling will be still, and every unkind thought will be laid in the dust. "He hath done all things well; in love and faithfulness hath He afflicted me," will be the only sounds uttered by the lips.
If then, beloved, you would have your heart always fixed on God, its affections flowing in one unbroken current towards Him, interpret every event that He sends in the light of His love. Never suffer yourself to be betrayed into the belief that any other feeling prompts the discipline; give not place to the suggestion for one moment, but banish it from the threshold of your mind the moment it seeks an entrance. Let this be the reflection that hushes and soothes you to repose, even as an infant upon its mother's breast: "My God is love! My Father is unchangeable tenderness and truth! He hath done it, and it is well done."
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MAY 31
"My people are bent to backsliding from me."—Hos 11:7
The divine life has its dwelling-place in a fallen, fleshly nature. It is encompassed by all the corruptions, weaknesses, infirmities, and assaults of the flesh. There is not a moment that it is not exposed to assaults from within. There is not a natural faculty of the mind or throb of the heart
that is favorable to its prosperity, but all are contrary to its nature, and hostile to its advance. As there is nothing internal that is favorable to a state of grace, so there is nothing external that encourages it forward. It has many and violent enemies. Satan is ever on the watch to assault it. The world is ever presenting itself in some new form of fascination and power to weaken it. A thousand temptations are perpetually striving to ensnare it. Thus its internal and external enemies are leagued against it. Is it then any wonder that faith should sometimes tremble, that grace should sometimes decline, and that the pulse of the divine life should often beat faintly and feebly?
The saints in every age have felt and lamented this. Hence the prayer of David, which is the prayer of all true believers: "Hold thou me up, and I shall be safe" (Ps 119:117), implying the greatest weakness in himself, and his perpetual exposure to the greatest falls. Hold Thou me up, for only as I am upheld by Thee am I safe. Again he prays, "Keep back thy servant also from presumptuous sins; let them not have dominion over me" (Ps 19:13), implying that a believer, left to the tendencies of his fallen nature, might become a prey to the worst sins. In addressing himself to the converted Hebrews, the apostle seizes the occasion thus to exhort them: "Take heed, brethren,
lest there be in any of you an evil heart of unbelief, in departing from the living God" (Heb 3:12). "In departing" implies a constant tendency to depart from God. And what does God Himself say of His people? "My people are bent to backsliding from me" (Hos 11:7). And again, "Why is this people of Jerusalem slidden back by a perpetual backsliding" (Jer 8:5)? Yes, it is a perpetual proneness to declension. The sun rises but to set, the clock is wound up but to run down; and it is no more natural for them thus to obey the laws that govern them, than for the heart of a child of God to follow the promptings of its corrupt and wayward nature.
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