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(done away with).
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, knavery(dishonest dealing) will not.
That which gives pleasure to God will
bring pleasure to us.
~Charles Spurgeon~
Samson was thirsty and ready to die.
The difficulty was totally
different from any which the hero had met before.
Merely to get thirst
assuaged is nothing like so great a matter as to be delivered from a
thousand Philistines!
But when the thirst was upon him, Samson felt that
little present difficulty more weighty than the great past difficulty
out of which he had so specially been delivered.
It is very usual for God's people, when they have enjoyed a great
deliverance, to find a little trouble too much for them.
Samson slays a
thousand Philistines, and piles them up in heaps, and then faints for a
little water!
Jacob wrestles with God at Peniel, and overcomes Omnipotence itself, and then goes "halting on his thigh!"
Strange that there must be a shrinking of the sinew whenever we win the
day.
As if the Lord must teach us our littleness, our nothingness, in
order to keep us within bounds.
Samson boasted right loudly when he
said, "I have slain a thousand men."
His boastful throat soon grew
hoarse with thirst, and he betook himself to prayer.
God has many ways of humbling His people.
Dear child of God, if after
great mercy you are laid very low, your case is not an unusual one.
When David had mounted the throne of Israel, he said, "I am this day
weak, though anointed king."
You must expect to feel weakest when you
are enjoying your greatest triumph.
If God has wrought for you great deliverances in the past, your present
difficulty is only like Samson's thirst, and the Lord will not let you
faint, nor suffer the daughter of the uncircumcised to triumph over you.
The road of sorrow is the road to heaven, but there are wells of refreshing water all along the route.
So, tried brother, cheer your heart with Samson's words, and rest assured that God will deliver you ere long.
~Charles Spurgeon~
Php 4:11 Not that I speak in respect of want: for I have learned, in whatsoever state I am, therewith to be content.
Paul, while being denied every comfort, wrote the above words from a dark prison cell.
A story is told of a king who went to his garden one morning, only to find everything withered and dying.
He asked the oak tree that stood near the gate what the trouble was.
The oak said it was tired of life and determined to die because it was not tall and beautiful like the pine tree.
The pine was troubled because it could not bear grapes like the grapevine.
The grapevine was determined to throw its life away because it could not stand erect
and produce fruit as large as peaches.
The geranium was fretting because it was not tall and fragrant like the lilac.
And so it went throughout the garden.
Yet coming to a violet, the king found its face as bright and happy as ever and said, “Well, violet, I’m glad to find one brave little flower in the midst of this discouragement.
You don’t seem to be the least disheartened.”
The violet responded,“No, I’m not....
I know I’m small, yet I thought if you wanted an oak or a pine or a peach tree or even a lilac, you would have planted one.
Since I knew you wanted a violet, I’m determined to be the best little violet I can be.
Others may do a greater work, But you have your part to do...
And no one in all God’s family Can do it as well as you.
People who are God’s without reservation “have learned to be content whatever the circumstances.”
His will becomes their will, and they desire to do for Him whatever He desires them to do.
They strip themselves of everything, and in their nakedness find everything restored a hundredfold.
Beware of manufacturing a God of your own:
A God who is all mercy, but not just;
A God who is all love, but not holy;
A God who has a heaven for every body, but a hell for none;
A God who can allow good and bad to be side by side in time...
But will make no distinction between good and bad in eternity.
Such a God is an idol of your own...
As truly an idol as any snake or crocodile in an Egyptian temple.
The hands of your own fancy and sentimentality have made him.
He is Not the God of the Bible...
And beside the God of the Bible there is no God at all.
~J.C. Ryle~
