Deu 12:28 Observe and hear all these words which I command thee, that it may go well with thee, and with thy children after thee for ever, when thou doest that which is good and right in the sight of the LORD thy God.
Though salvation is not by the works of the law, yet the blessings which are promised to obedience are not denied to the faithful servants of God.
The curses our LORD took away when He was made a curse for us, but no clause of blessing has been abrogated.
We are to note and listen to the revealed will of the LORD, giving our attention not to portions of it but to "all these words."
There must be no picking and choosing but an impartial respect to all that God has commanded.
This is the road of blessedness for the Father and for His children.
The LORD's blessing is upon His chosen to the third and fourth generation.
If they walk uprightly before Him, He will make all men know that they are a seed which the LORD has blessed.
No blessing can come to us or ours through dishonesty or double dealing.
The ways of worldly conformity and unholiness cannot bring good to us or ours.
It will go well with us when we go well before God.
If integrity does not make us prosper, dishonest dealing will not.
That which gives pleasure to God will bring pleasure to us.
~Charles Spurgeon~
Heb 4:14 Seeing then that we have a great high priest, that is passed into the heavens, Jesus the Son of God, let us hold fast our profession.
Heb 4:15 For we have not an high priest which cannot be touched with the feeling of our infirmities; but was in all points tempted like as we are, yet without sin.
Heb 4:16 Let us therefore come boldly unto the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy, and find grace to help in time of need.
Our
great Helper in prayer is the Lord Jesus Christ, our Advocate with the
Father, our Great High Priest, whose chief ministry for us these
centuries has been intercession and prayer.
He it is who takes our
imperfect petitions from our hands, cleanses them from their defects,
corrects their faults, and then claims their answer from His Father on
His own account and through His all-atoning merits and righteousness.
Brother,
are you fainting in prayer? Look up.
Your blessed Advocate has already
claimed your answer, and you would grieve and disappoint Him if you were
to give up the conflict in the very moment when victory is on its way
to meet you.
He has gone in for you into the inner chamber, and already
holds up your name upon the palms of His hands;
And the messenger, which
is to bring you your blessing, is now on his way, and the Spirit is
only waiting your trust to whisper in your heart the echo of the answer
from the throne, "It is done."
~A. B. Simpson~
The
Spirit has much to do with acceptable prayer, and His work in prayer is
too much neglected.
He enlightens the mind to see its wants, softens the
heart to feel them...
Quickens our desires after suitable supplies...
Gives
clear views of God's power, wisdom, and grace to relieve us...
And stirs
up that confidence in His truth which excludes all wavering.
Prayer is,
therefore, a wonderful thing.
In every acceptable prayer the whole
Trinity is concerned.
~J. Angell James~
First, note
that he was a man unanswered.
He knew the bitterness of heaven's
silence.
His opening cry in our deep psalm is this: "Hide not thyself
from my supplication".
Give ear to my prayer, O God; and hide not thyself from my supplication. Psa 55:1
It is an easy thing
to trust in God when swiftly and certainly our prayers are answered.
There are some who read this column whose life is a compact of answered
prayer.
But when we pray and the face of God is hidden, and we are
restless because heaven is silent-it is often difficult to trust Him
then.
Especially is that true of intercession when we have been praying
for someone who is dear, that God would spare a life or kill a habit or
bring the beloved prodigal home again.
To continue trusting when we have
prayed like that and the prayers have seemed to go whistling down the
wind, is one of the hardest tasks in human life.
The splendid thing is
that the psalmist did it. He refused to regard silence as indifference.
He knew that a thousand days are as one day to God and that sometimes
love delays the chariot wheels.
Heaven might be silent and the face of
God averted and all the comfort of fellowship withdrawn, but I will
trust in thee.
~George H. Morrison~
We all have resurrection Life if we are joined to Christ as Resurrection, but there is something more than that;
There is resurrection power, which carries us eventually (if it has its full outworking) to the Throne, and not all will come to the Throne.
It is: “to him that overcomes.” Caleb, like Paul, and Paul, like Caleb, stood against the more general course of things amongst the Lord’s people.
The majority were content with going so far as to the inheritance, possessing so much, and there staying and settling down.
An unfinished course, a curtailed spiritual advance, an accepting of something less than what God had appointed and intended.
The majority took that course, but Caleb was never content and he stood against the majority just as he had always stood against a majority that did not represent God’s full mind....
Spiritual leadership always involves loneliness.
That is the cost of it.
The overcomers will always be, so far as the larger Christian world is concerned, a lonely company, having to go on, with few able to follow.
Caleb could not accept the popular voice, his heart was too set upon the Lord.
He wholly followed the Lord, not the popular and general standard of Christian life.
We may say that Caleb was the very embodiment of all that God meant the whole people to be.
When you see Caleb you see what God wished all Israel to be, but all Israel did not come to the standard of Caleb.
But the Lord gets in a Caleb the satisfaction of His heart.
The Lord realizes His full thought in a Caleb, in the same way as He does in a Paul.
~T. Austin Sparks~
Num 31:8 And they slew the kings of Midian, beside the rest of them that were slain; namely, Evi, and Rekem, and Zur, and Hur, and Reba, five kings of Midian: Balaam also the son of Beor they slew with the sword.
Balaam had taken the field against Israel-against a people whom he had
pronounced blessed-whom he had pronounced invincible both by earth and
hell.
Yes; Balaam "the son of Beor," he, and not another of the name-he
rushes on the bosses of the Almighty's buckler; he defies Israel and
Israel's God!
But he fails.
He would sincerely have cursed Israel; but he
could not.
He counseled Moab to seduce Israel by temptation, and his device
succeeded too well.
He now fetches his last stroke. In vain He perishes
ignobly.
He is slain with the sword which he had defied.
Such is the end of
the backslider; of one who knew the truth but did it not; who once said,
"Let me die the death of the righteous, and let my last end be like his."
It
was certainly not the end he prayed for; yet it was the end to which his
whole life had been tending.
He reaped what he sowed, and in him "God was
not mocked."
He died as he lived, in fellowship with Moab, yet in heart
persuaded that Israel was the beloved of the Lord, and that Jehovah was God.
His life had been with Midian, and so was his death.
His grave is with the
unclean.
He passes from earth with none to soothe his death-bed and close
his eyes; none to lament for him or to build his monument.
Sad end of a life of halting and indecision, and resistance of the Spirit,
and braving of conscience, and rejection of light, and wretched
covetousness.
He loved the wages of unrighteousness, and verily he had his
reward.
Let us see what he wanted and how he failed; how ambitious he was,
yet what a life of utter failure and disappointment was his.
He would
sincerely have risen, but he sunk.
He would sincerely have been rich, but he
lost everything.
What a wasted life!
Yet the life of one who knew better
things but did them not; who knew that the world was vanity, yet followed
it;
Who knew that Israel's portion was the best, yet chose that of Moab; who
knew the true God and the true Messiah, but preferred the idolatries of
Israel's enemies.
He saw Him from the top of the rocks, but that was all.
He
got a passing glimpse of the cross, but no more.
It was all he saw of the
way of life, before he plunged into death and woe.
I. He wanted to serve two masters.
These were the same as the Lord in after
days designated God and mammon. He wanted not to offend either; to please
both.
He was like Issachar crouching between two burdens. But it would not
do.
He failed. Such is the certain failure of all who make the like attempt.
"You cannot serve God and mammon."
He loved the one master, mammon; and he
dreaded the other; but would sincerely do the will of both.
He could not
afford to lose the favor of either. Miserable life! More miserable death!
The life and death of one whose whole career was one long attempt to do the
bidding both of God and the devil.
II. He wanted to earn two kinds of wages.
The wages of righteousness and the
wages of unrighteousness were both in his eyes; he would
sincerely have the pay both of God and of the devil.
2Pe 2:15 Which have forsaken the right way, and are gone astray, following the way of Balaam the son of Bosor, who loved the wages of unrighteousness;
He was unwilling to do
or say anything which would deprive him of either.
He was as cautious and cunning
as he was covetous.
He would not work without wages; and he would work for a
hundred masters if they would only pay him well.
How like many so-called
"religious" men among ourselves.
III. He wanted to do two opposite things at the same time.
He wished both to
bless and to curse.
He was willing to do either according as it might serve
his interests.
The only question with him was, "Would it pay?"
If the
blessing would pay, he would take it; if the curse would pay, he would take
it.
If both would pay, he would take them both.
Blessing and cursing were
both alike to him, confessing and denying the true God, worshiping Baal or
Jehovah, it mattered not, if by "this craft he could have his wealth."
So
with many among us. If Sabbath-keeping will pay, they will keep the Sabbath;
if Sabbath-breaking will pay, they will break the Sabbath.
True Balaams–
without principle, without faith, and without fear!
IV. He wanted two kinds of friendship.
He would sincerely be friends with
everybody. Perhaps he was timid; of those whom Scripture calls "fearful"
Rev 21:8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers, and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters, and all liars, shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death.
Perhaps, also, he was ambitious, and sought great things
for himself wherever these could be obtained...
Jer 45:5 And seekest thou great things for thyself? seek them not: for, behold, I will bring evil upon all flesh, saith the LORD: but thy life will I give unto thee for a prey in all places whither thou goest.
Certainly he
had before him "the fear of man which brings a snare," and the love of man's
approbation which brings no less a snare;
He dreaded Israel's God, of whom
he knew much, but he dreaded also Moab's gods, though whether he really
believed in them we know not.
Made up of these contradictions, and acting
not by faith but unbelief, he tried to secure the friendship of all whom he
counted great, whether in heaven or in earth.
He shut his eyes not only to
the sin but to the impossibility of such a course;
He saw not that the
friendship of the world is the enemy of God, and that whoever will be the
friend of the world must be the enemy of God.
V. He wanted to have two religions.
He saw religion to be a paying concern,
a profitable trade, and he was willing to accept it from anybody or
everybody, to adopt it from any quarter if it would but raise him in the
world, and make his fortune.
Perhaps he thought all religions equally right
or equally wrong, equally true or equally false.
He would rather not offend
any god if lie could help it.
He would make concessions to "religious
prejudices" of any kind if the prejudiced people will only help him on.
He
was like Erasmus of old, whom a German writer thus describes– "Erasmus
belongs to that species of writers who have all the desire to build God a
magnificent church; at the same time, however, not giving the devil any offense...
To whom, accordingly, they set up a neat little chapel close by,
where you can offer him some touch of sacrifice at a time, and practice a
quiet household devotion for him without disturbance."
Such was Balaam; two gods and two religions he wanted to have.
But this
double service, and double friendship, and double religion would not do.
He
could make nothing by them. They profited him nothing either in this life or
that to come.
His end was with the ungodly, his portion with the enemies of
Israel.
And his soul, where could it be? Not with Israel's God, or Israel's
Christ, or in Israel's heaven.
He reaped what he sowed.
He was a good
specimen of multitudes in these last days.
An educated and intelligent man,
shrewd and quick-seeing, of respectable character, high in favor with the
rich and great, a religious man, too, after a fashion, not unsound in creed
so far, for he acknowledges Jehovah as the true God.
But he is fond of the world, fond of money, fond of preferment; one that
would not let his religion stand in the way of his advancement; who could
pocket all scruples if he could pocket a little gold along with them;
Hollow
of heart, but with a fair outside; just an Erasmus; no Luther, no Calvin, no
Knox, no confessor, no martyr.
His worldly interests are the main thing to
him.
He would rather not risk offending God, but yet he would not like to
lose Balak's rewards and honors.
He would rather not take up his cross, nor deny himself, nor forsake all for
his God.
Religion with him is not just a thing to be suffered for-at least
if he can help it.
So is it with multitudes among us. They want as much
religion as will save them from hell; not an atom more.
The world is their
real God; gold is their idol; it is in mammon's temple that they worship.
Love God with all their heart! They don't so much as understand the meaning
of such a thing.
Sacrifice riches, place, honor, friends to Christ! They
scoff at the thing as madness.
Oh, be on the side of God, out and out. Don't
trifle with religion.
Don't mock God and Christ.
Love not the world.
Be religious in your inmost
soul.
Don't mistake sentimentalism for religion, or a good character for the
new birth.
You may go very far and yet not be a Christian.
You may follow
Christ in some things; but if not in all, what is your following worth?
This
world or the world to come, that is the alternative; not this world and the
world to come.
Christ all or nothing.
The soul more precious than worlds, or
utterly worthless.
No middle ground; no half-discipleship; no compromise.
No. The friendship of the world is enmity with God.
Come out and be
separate. The new birth, or no religion at all.
Look to your latter end!
What is it to be?
Where is it to be?
With whom is
it to be?
Anticipate your eternity.
Is it to be darkness or light, shame or
glory?
Oh make sure, make sure!
Do not sear your conscience by praying
Balaam's prayer, "Let me die the death of the righteous."
What will that
avail you?
It is the life of the righteous that God is calling you to lead
and he will take care of your death.
Decide, halt not; else surely yours
will be a wretched life and a still more wretched death.
What will gold, or
purple, or honor do for you when you lie down to die, or rise up to be
judged?
~Horatius Bonar~
Yesterday's promise secured us
strength for what we have to do, but this guarantees us aid in cases
where we cannot act alone.
The LORD says, "I will help thee."
Strength
within is supplemented by help without.
God can raise us up allies in
our warfare if so it seems good in His sight;
And even if He does not
send us human assistance, He Himself will be at our side, and this is
better still.
Our August Ally is better than legions of mortal
helpers.
His help is timely: He is a
very present help in time of trouble.
His help is very wise: He knows
how to give each man help meet and fit for him.
His help is most
effectual, though vain is the help of man.
His help is more than help,
for He bears all the burden and supplies all the need.
The LORD is my
helper, I will not fear what man can do unto me.
Because He has already been our
help, we feel confidence in Him for the present and the future.
Our
prayer is, "LORD, by thou my helper";
Our experience is, "The Spirit
also helpeth our infirmities";
Our expectation is, "I will lift up mine
eyes unto the hills, whence cometh my help";
And our song soon will be,
"Thou, LORD, hast holden me."
~Charles Spurgeon~
Hos 2:18 And in that day will I make a covenant for them with the beasts of the field, and with the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground: and I will break the bow and the sword and the battle out of the earth, and will make them to lie down safely.
Yes, the saints are to have peace.
The passage from which this gracious
word is taken speaks of peace with the beasts of the field, and with
the fowls of heaven, and with the creeping things of the ground.
This
is peace with earthly enemies, with mysterious evils, and with little
annoyances!
Any of these might keep us from lying down, but none of them
shall do so.
The LORD will quite destroy those things which threaten
His people: "I will break the bow and the sword, and the battle out of
the earth."
Peace will be profound indeed when all the instruments of
disquiet are broken to pieces.
With this peace will come rest, "So he giveth his beloved sleep."
Fully
supplied and divinely quieted, believers lie down in calm repose. This
rest will be a safe one.
It is one thing to lie down but quite another
"to lie down safely."
We are brought to the land of promise, the house
of the Father, the chamber of love, and the bosom of Christ: surely we
may now "lie down safely."
It is safer for a believer to lie down in
peace than to sit up and worry.
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures, We never rest till the Comforter makes us lie down.
~Charles Spurgeon~
