Holy Foresight

Ah, LORD, Thou wast in Thy lowest state when before Thy persecutors Thou wast made to stand like a criminal! 

Yet the eyes of Thy faith could see beyond Thy present humiliation into Thy future glory. 

What words are these, "Nevertheless - hereafter!"

I would imitate Thy holy foresight, and in the midst of poverty, or sickness, or slander, I also would say, "Nevertheless - hereafter."

Instead of weakness, Thou hast all power...

Instead of shame, all glory...

Instead of derision, all worship, 

Thy cross has not dimmed the splendor of Thy crown, neither has the spittle marred the beauty of Thy face. 

Say, rather, Thou are the more exalted and honored because of Thy sufferings.

So, LORD, I also would take courage from the "hereafter." 

I would forget the present tribulation in the future triumph. 

Help thou me by directing me into Thy Father's love and into Thine own patience...

So that when I am derided for Thy name I may not be staggered but think more and more of the hereafter, and, therefore, all the less of today. 

I shall be with Thee soon and behold Thy glory. 

Wherefore, I am not ashamed but say in my inmost soul, "Nevertheless - hereafter." 

~Charles Spurgeon~

Our Cherith

1Ki 17:3  Get thee hence, and turn thee eastward, and hide thyself by the brook Cherith, that is before Jordan. 

God's servants must be taught the value of the hidden life. 

The man who is to take a high place before his fellows - must take a low place before his God. 

We must not be surprised if sometimes our Father says: "There, child, you have had enough of this hurry, and publicity, and excitement; get hence, and hide yourself by the brook...

Hide yourself . . .in the Cherith of the sick chamber, or in the Cherith of bereavement, or in some solitude from which the crowds have ebbed away.

Happy is he who can reply, "This Your will is also mine; I flee unto You to hide me."

Hide me in the secret of Your tabernacle, and beneath the covert of Your wings!

Every saintly soul who would wield great power with men, must win it in some hidden Cherith. 

The acquisition of spiritual power is impossible, unless we can hide ourselves from men and from ourselves, in some deep gorge where we may absorb the power of the eternal God...

As vegetation through long ages absorbed these qualities of sunshine, which it now gives back through burning coal.

Passing back to the blessed age from which we date the centuries: 

Patmos; the seclusion of the Roman prisons; the Arabian desert; the hills and valleys of Palestine...are forever memorable as the holy Cheriths of the new testament disciples.

Our Lord found His Cheriths at Nazareth; in the wilderness of Judea; amid the olive groves of Bethany; and the solitude of Gadara.

None of us, therefore, can dispense with some Cherith, where the sounds of human voices are exchanged for the waters of quietness, which are fed from the throne of God...

And where we may taste the sweets and imbibe the power of a life hidden with Christ.

~F. B. Meyer~

Full Reliance On God

Psa 72:12  For he shall deliver the needy when he crieth; the poor also, and him that hath no helper.

The needy cries; what else can he do? 

His cry is heard of God; what else need he do?

Let the needy reader take to crying at once, for this will be his wisdom. 

Do not cry in the ears of friends, for even if they can help you it is only because the LORD enables them. 

The nearest way is to go straight to God and let your cry come up before Him. 

Straightforward makes the best runner:

Run to the LORD and not to secondary causes.
 
Alas! you cry, "I have no friend or helper." 

So much the better; you can rely upon God in both capacities - as without supplies and without helpers. 

Make your double need your double plea. 

Even for temporal mercies you may wait upon God, for He careth for His children in these temporary concerns. 

As for spiritual necessities, which are the heaviest of all, the LORD will hear your cry and will deliver you and supply you.

O poor friend, try your rich God. 

O helpless one, lean on His help. 

He has never failed me, and I am sure He will never fail you. 

Come as a beggar, and God will not refuse you help. 

Come with no plea but His grace. 

Jesus is King; will He let you perish of wants What! 

Did you forget this! 

~Charles Spurgeon~

We May Speak For God

Jer 15:19  Therefore thus saith the LORD, If thou return, then will I bring thee again, and thou shalt stand before me: and if thou take forth the precious from the vile, thou shalt be as my mouth: let them return unto thee; but return not thou unto them.

Poor Jeremiah! Yet why do we say so? 

The weeping prophet was one of the choicest servants of God and honored by Him above many. 

He was hated for speaking the truth. 

The word which was so sweet to him was bitter to his hearers, yet he was accepted of his LORD. 

He was commanded to abide in his faithfulness...

And then the LORD would continue to speak through him. 

He was to deal boldly and truthfully with men and perform the LORD's winnowing work upon the professors of his day...

And then the LORD gave him this word: "Thou shalt be as my mouth."

What an honor! 

Should not every preacher, yea, every believer, covet it? 

For God to speak by us, what a marvel! 

We shall speak sure, pure truth; and we shall speak it with power. 

Our word shall not return void...

It shall be a blessing to those who receive it...

And those who refuse it shall do so at their peril. 

Our lips shall feed many. 

We shall arouse the sleeping and call the dead to life.

O dear reader, pray that it may be so with all the sent servants of our LORD.

~Charles Spurgeon~

The Root Upon Which Our Blessings Grow

All Christians desire to be purified and made white...

But when it comes to being tried, that is a very different thing.

They shrink from the very word. 

Their trials are to them as a nightmare from which they would gladly escape. 

But trials are a necessary part of God's process of preparing us for Heaven.

The storms and obstacles in our lives, all work out for our good if we meet them as we should. 

Through them, our lives are enriched and ennobled and developed. 

They are blessings to us, though they may seem to be blessings very much disguised.

Life has both its bitter and its sweet. 

We should not always expect to have the sweet alone. 

Sometimes circumstances are in our favor, and work for our happiness, peace and contentment. 

Sometimes we have smooth sailing, and everything goes pleasantly. 

We are courageous and confident and rejoicing. 

The sun shines brightly out of a cloudless sky, and every prospect seems fair.

But this smooth sailing does not last forever. 

Sooner or later, the clouds must come and the storm-winds beat upon us. 

We must have the rough weather as well as the pleasant weather; the storm--as well as the calm.

The sunshine and the calm are very needful in life-and they work out a definite purpose.
 
But the storms and the rain and the wind are likewise needed-and they also fulfill their purpose.

Trials will come...we cannot evade them. 

We may plan and build up hopes-only to have our air-castles come crashing down around our heads! 

If we have set our hearts upon these things, we are likely to be very disappointed upon their wreck, and to feel very gloomy over the result.

How greatly we are affected by our trials, depends on whether or not we sweetly submit to them. 

We should never fret on account of disappointments. 

If we do, they will only grow more rapidly, both in size and in intensity.

Losses may come to us-our property may be swept away or burned up. 

If we have our hearts set upon our possessions-then this may touch a tender spot, and it will darken our lives and make us morose and dissatisfied.

Poverty may come and the many difficulties incident thereto.

Sickness may lay its heavy hand upon us or our loved ones, and try every fiber of our being. 

Sickness may play upon the chords of pain, a lamentation that incites with exquisite torture! 

Or it may fire our blood with fever until the sparkle has gone from the eye and the glow of health from the cheek. 

Or it may bind us helplessly captive in chains.

Death may come and take those dear by the ties of nature or friendship-and leave sorrow and grief to be our companions.

These things try the soul, but they must be borne. 

We cannot escape such things, for they are the common heritage of those who dwell in tabernacles of clay. 

They belong to mortality and to the mutable things of time. 

How greatly such things may affect us, will depend upon how much we rebel against the circumstances...

Or how easily we submit to and adapt ourselves to God's will. 

God may chasten you sorely, but He will do it for your profit, not for your destruction.

Our trials are the root upon which our blessings grow. 

These roots may be bitter-but the fruit is sure to be sweet, if we patiently wait for its maturing. 

Many choice fruits grow on thorny trees, and he who will gather the fruit, may expect to be pricked now and then by the thorns.

We cannot escape trials.

The only thing some Christians do by rebelling, is to increase their suffering in the trials and prevent themselves from getting the blessedness out of them.

We ought to be willing to suffer when it is God's will for us to suffer, and when He sees it is necessary for us to suffer. 

Our Master drank the cup of suffering, even though it was bitter. 

Are we better than He? 

Shall we refuse to go by the path which led Him to glory?

~Charles Naylor~

Let This Comfort You

Psa 31:15  My times are in thy hand: deliver me from the hand of mine enemies, and from them that persecute me.

What a mercy it is that all our concerns are in sure hands! 

Not a hair of our heads can fall to the ground, but by the appointment of Him who orders and marshals the stars and calls them all by their names!

Diseases and sicknesses are His messengers, and, when they have answered His end-then He will recall them. 

But on many accounts there is a need be that we should sometimes be in heaviness for a season. 

O may we learn to take up the cross, and to kiss the rod of affliction. 

We need to look through all second causes-to Him who appoints and over-rules, and without whose permission, not a hair of our heads shall fall to the ground.

The Lord has promised to direct, moderate, sanctify, and relieve every trial of every kind. 

I long to have a more entire submission to His will, and a more steadfast confidence in His Word...

To trust Him and wait on Him--to see His hand, and praise His name, in every circumstance of life, great and small.

Is sickness your present cross?

It can come no sooner, nor fall heavier, than He bids it. 

And when His end is answered, and His hour comes to give relief-then sickness departs at His word. 

The cure becomes easy then, even where it seemed desperate before.

Our comforts are never safer than when we can fully trust the Lord to do with them, and with us-as He sees fit. 

He will not willingly or unnecessarily grieve His redeemed children. 

When His arm seems lifted up to strike them-how often does He put it into their hearts to run toward Him and humble themselves before Him, and thus prevent the blow!

We shall have cause to be thankful for all our afflictions-if the Lord is pleased to employ them as means to make us more humble and broken-hearted, and to wean our hearts from this vain world.

Sickness often gives us a sensible proof of the vanity of everything earthly. 

May the Lord sanctify our sicknesses and pains, to quicken our desires for that better world, when pain shall be no more!

~John Newton~