And They Shall Be Mine Saith The LORD Of Hosts!

Mal 3:17  And they shall be mine, saith the LORD of hosts, in that day when I make up my jewels; and I will spare them, as a man spareth his own son that serveth him. 

If we have committed ourselves to God thoroughly...

And really meant with the Lord that we want His full will and we do not want our own...

And by His grace we will go the way that He leads and shows, whatever it costs...

If we have done that...

And then situations have arisen which look terribly complicated...

And seem to contradict the faithfulness of God... 

What am I to conclude?

What are we going to conclude? 

We have to conclude one of two things...

That God cares nothing for all our devotion and consecration, and just lets us get into any mess...

Or else this is all under His eye.

That is ultimate. 

We have either to believe God or not to believe Him. 

You have all this here in the Word, and it all bears down upon this...

That people who are related in Divine foreknowledge and Divine sovereign action come into situations like that...

But in the end that sovereignty has been shown to relate to something unusually precious to the Lord...

And they shall be Mine, saith the Lord of hosts, even Mine own possession, in the day that I do make  up my jewels.

The Lord is after something more than ordinary and He needs a people for it...

But such a people will have unusual experiences, inside and out. 

It will not be the ordinary, normal course where everything goes well and straightforwardly. 

It will not be like that for these people. 

They go through ways that are tortuous and exceedingly difficult...

But there is a sovereignty at work. 

That is my way of analyzing and summing up the situation as I see it in the Word...

And I can only say to you that it is not foreign and strange to God's special purposes to have experiences like that. 

Whether it be the remnant of Israel...

Whether it be the reactions of God in this Christian dispensation...

In the book of the Revelation...

The messages to the churches which are just on this ground, it is all like this. 

Nothing seems normal with a people like that...

Because God is not going to have anything that is just normal, as we call the normal. 

It is something more, something extraordinary, and our experience therefore is extraordinary.

~T. Austin Sparks

We Went Through Fire And Water But You Brought Us Out!

Paradoxical though it be, only that man is at rest who attains it through conflict. 

This peace, born of conflict, is not like the deadly hush preceding the tempest, but the serene and pure-aired quiet that follows it.

It is not generally the prosperous one, who has never sorrowed, who is strong and at rest. 

His quality has never been tried, and he knows not how he can stand even a gentle shock. 

He is not the safest sailor who never saw a tempest; he will do for fair-weather service...

But when the storm is rising, place at the important post the man who has fought out a gale, who has tested the ship, who knows her hulk sound, her rigging strong, and her anchor-flukes able to grasp and hold by the ribs of the world.

When first affliction comes upon us, how everything gives way! 

Our clinging, tendril hopes are snapped, and our heart lies prostrate like a vine that the storm has torn from its trellis...

But when the first shock is past, and we are able to look up, and say, "It is the Lord," faith lifts the shattered hopes once more, and binds them fast to the feet of God. 

Thus the end is confidence, safety, and peace. 

~Selected

The adverse winds blew against my life; My little ship with grief was tossed; My plans were gone...

Heart full of strife, And all my hope seemed to be lost...

Then He arose-one word of peace. 

There was a calm-a sweet release.

A tempest great of doubt and fear Possessed my mind...

No light was there To guide, or make my vision clear. 

Dark night! 'twas more than I could bear...   

Then He arose, I saw His face...   

There was a calm filled with His grace.

My heart was sinking 'neath the wave Of deepening test and raging grief...   

All seemed as lost, and none could save...   

And nothing could bring me relief...

Then He arose-and spoke one word... 

There was a calm! IT IS THE LORD. 

~L. S. P.