One Of The Secrets Of A Happy And Beautiful Life!

                                      
Deu 33:25  Thy shoes shall be iron and brass; and as thy days, so shall thy strength be.

One of the secrets of happy and beautiful life, is to Live One Day At A Time. 

Really, we never have anything to do any day-but the bit of God's will for that day. 

If we do that well-we have absolutely nothing else to do.

Time is given to us in days. It was so from the beginning. 

This breaking up of time into little daily portions means a great deal more than we are accustomed to think. 

For one thing, it illustrates the gentleness and goodness of God.

It would have made life intolerably burdensome if a year, instead of a day had been the unit of division. 

It would have been hard to carry a heavy load, to endure a great sorrow, or to keep on at a hard duty-for such a long stretch of time. 

How dreary our common task-work would be if there were no breaks in it, if we had to keep our hand to the plough for a whole year! 

We never could go on with our struggles, our battles, our suffering-if night did not mercifully settle down with its darkness, and bid us rest and renew our strength.

We do not understand how great a mercy there is for us in the briefness of our short days. 

If they were even twice as long as they are-life would be intolerable! 

Many a time when the sun goes down-we feel that we could scarcely have gone another step. 

We would have fainted in defeat-if the summons to rest had not come just when it did.

We see the graciousness of the divine thoughtfulness in giving us time in periods of little days, which we can easily get through with...

And not in great years, in which we would faint and fall by the way. 

It makes it possible for us to go on through all the long years and not to be overwrought, for we never have given to us at any one time-more than we can do between the morning and the evening.

If we learn well the lesson of living just one day at a time, without anxiety for either yesterday or tomorrow, we shall have found one of the great secrets of Christian peace. 

That is the way God teaches us to live. 

That is the lesson both of the Bible and of nature.

If we learn it, it will cure us of all anxiety...

It will save us from all feverish haste...

It will enable us to live sweetly in any experience.

Mat 6:34  Take therefore no thought for the morrow: for the morrow shall take thought for the things of itself. Sufficient unto the day is the evil thereof. 

~J. R. Miller~

The Development of Consecration~"Let Us Go On"

Heb 6:1  Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God,

The real value of this exhortation is found in the implication of the Greek word used.

It is the same word as in Acts 2:2 ("rushing") and II Peter 1:21 ("moved").
 
It really means to be borne along by another.
 
This would indicate that God is moving on, the Spirit of God is going forward.

He is not tarrying or delaying, but with great energy is pursuing His goal.

Let us fall in with Him.
 
Let us be caught in His goings.

Let us yield to His energies.

Let us not be left behind by the Lord.

"Full-growth" is His goal;

Let us not remain infants or immature.

~T. Austin Sparks~ 

Mark Of Divine Approval

                                                     

Yes, he is blessed while he is enduring the trial. 

No eye can see this till he has been anointed with heavenly eye salve. 

But he must endure it and neither rebel against God nor turn aside from his integrity. 

He is blessed who has gone through the fire and has not been consumed as a counterfeit. 

When the test is over, then comes the hallmark of divine approval..."the crown of life." 

As if the LORD said, "Let him live; he has been weighed in the balances, and he is not found wanting." 

Life is the reward: not mere being, but holy, happy, true existence, the realization of the divine purpose concerning us. 

Already a higher form of spiritual life and enjoyment crowns those who have safely passed through fiercest trials of faith and love. 

The LORD hath promised the crown of life to those who love Him. 

Only lovers of the LORD will hold out in the hour of trial; the rest will either sink or sulk, or slink back to the world. 

Come, my heart, dost thou love thy LORD?

Truly?

Deeply? 

Wholly? 

Then that love will be tried; but many waters will not quench it, neither will the Roods drown it...

LORD, let Thy love nourish mine to the end.

~Charles Spurgeon~

What Cannot Be Uttered

Rom 8:26  Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
 
Rom 8:27  And he that searcheth the hearts knoweth what is the mind of the Spirit, because he maketh intercession for the saints according to the will of God.
     
This is the deep mystery of prayer. 

This is the delicate divine mechanism which words cannot interpret, and which theology cannot explain, but which the humblest believer knows even when he does not understand.
      
Oh, the burdens that we love to bear and cannot understand! 

Oh, the inarticulate out-reachings of our hearts for things we cannot comprehend!

And yet we know they are an echo from the throne and a whisper from the heart of God. 

It is often a groan rather than a song, a burden rather than a buoyant wing. 

But it is a blessed burden, and it is a groan whose undertone is praise and unutterable joy. 

It is "a groaning which cannot be uttered." 

We could not ourselves express it always, and sometimes we do not understand any more than that God is praying in us, for something that needs His touch and that He understands.

And so we can just pour out the fullness of our heart, the burden of our spirit, the sorrow that crushes us, and know that He hears, He loves, He understands, He receives; 

And He separates from our prayer all that is imperfect, ignorant and wrong, and presents the rest, with the incense of the great High Priest, before the throne on high; 

And our prayer is heard, accepted and answered in His name.

~A. B. Simpson~

It is not necessary to be always speaking to God or always hearing from God, to have communion with Him; there is an inarticulate fellowship more sweet than words. 

The little child can sit all day long beside its busy mother and, although few words are spoken on either side, and both are busy, the one at his absorbing play, the other at her engrossing work, yet both are in perfect fellowship. 

He knows that she is there, and she knows that he is all right. 

So the saint and the Saviour can go on for hours in the silent fellowship of love, and he be busy about the most common things, and yet conscious that every little thing he does is touched with the complexion of His presence, and the sense of His approval and blessing.

And then, when pressed with burdens and troubles too complicated to put into words and too mysterious to tell or understand, how sweet it is to fall back into His blessed arms, and just sob out the sorrow that we cannot speak!

~Selected~
     

A Strong Heart

Wait! Wait! Let your waiting be on the LORD! 

He is worth waiting for.

He never disappoints the waiting soul. 

While waiting keep up your spirits, Expect a great deliverance, and be ready to praise God for it.

The promise which should cheer you is in the middle of the verse..."He shall strengthen thine heart." 

This goes at once to the place where you need help. 

If the heart be sound, all the rest of the system will work well. 

The heart wants calming and cheering, and both of these will come if it be strengthened. 

A forceful heart rests and rejoices and throbs force into the whole man. 

No one else can get at that secret urn of life, the heart, so as to pour strength into it.

He alone who made it can make it strong. 

God is full of strength, and, therefore, He can impart it to those who need it. 

Oh, be brave; for the LORD will impart His strength to you, and you shall be calm in tempest and glad in sorrow.

He who penned these lines can write as David did..."Wait, I say, on the LORD."

I do, indeed, say it.

I know by long and deep experience that it is good for me to wait upon the LORD.

~Charles Spurgeon~

Plentiful Refreshment

Jer 31:12  Therefore they shall come and sing in the height of Zion, and shall flow together to the goodness of the LORD, for wheat, and for wine, and for oil, and for the young of the flock and of the herd: and their soul shall be as a watered garden; and they shall not sorrow any more at all.

Oh, to have one's soul under heavenly cultivation; no longer a wilderness but a garden of the LORD! 

Enclosed from the waste, walled around by grace, planted by instruction, visited by love, weeded by heavenly discipline, and guarded by divine power, one's favored soul is prepared to yield fruit unto the LORD. 

But a garden may become parched for want of water, and then all its herbs decline and are ready to die. 

O my soul, how soon would this be the case were the LORD to leave thee! 

In the East, a garden without water soon ceases to be a garden at all: nothing can come to perfection, grow, or even live. 

When irrigation is kept up, the result is charming.

Oh, to have one's soul watered by the Holy Spirit uniformly... every part of the garden having its own stream; 

Plentifully a sufficient refreshment coming to every tree and herb, however thirsty by nature it may be; 

Continually each hour bringing not only its heat, but its refreshment; wisely - each plant receiving just what it needs. 

In a garden you can see by the verdure where the water flows, and you can soon perceive when the Spirit of God comes. 

O LORD, water me this day and cause me to yield Thee a full reward for Jesus' sake. Amen.

~Charles Spurgeon~                                                                                   
                                                                               
                                                                          

God Above Human Philosophy

This verse is a threatening so far as the worldly wise are concerned, but to the simple believer it is a promise. 

The professedly learned are forever trying to bring to nothing the faith of the humble believer, but they fail in their attempts. 

Their arguments break down, their theories fall under their own weight, their deep-laid plots discover themselves before their purpose is accomplished.

The old gospel is not extinct yet, nor will it be while the LORD liveth. 

If it could have been exterminated, it would have perished from off the earth long ago.

We cannot destroy the wisdom of the wise, nor need we attempt it, for the work is in far better hands. 

The LORD Himself says, "I will," and He never resolves in vain.

Twice does He in this verse declare His purpose, and we may rest assured that He will not turn aside from it. 

What clean work the LORD makes of philosophy and "modern thought" when He puts His hand to it! 

He brings the fine appearance down to nothing; 

He utterly destroys the wood, hay, and stubble.

It is written that so it shall be, and so shall it be. LORD, make short work of it. 

Amen, and amen.

~Charles Spurgeon~

Who Has The Majority?

Horses and chariots and a great host shut up the prophet in Dothan. 

His young servant was alarmed. 

How could they escape from such a body of armed men?

But the prophet had eyes which his servant had not, and he could see a greater host with far superior weapons guarding him from all harm.

Horses of fire are mightier than horses of flesh, and chariots of fire are far preferable to chariots of iron.

Even so is it at this hour. 

The adversaries of truth are many, influential, learned, and crafty; and truth fares ill at their hands; and yet the man of God has no cause for fearing. 

Agencies, seen and unseen, of the most potent kind, are on the side of righteousness. 

God has armies in ambush which will reveal themselves in the hour of need.

The forces which are on the side of the good and the true far outweigh the powers of evil. 

Therefore, let us keep our spirits up, and walk with the gait of men who possess a cheering secret, which has lifted them above all fear. 

We are on the winning side.

The battle may be sharp, but we know how it will end.

Faith, having God with her, is in a clear majority: "They that be with us are more than they that be with them."

~Charles Spurgeon~

Before And During The Call

Isa 65:24  And it shall come to pass, that before they call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.

Quick work this! The LORD hears us before we call and often answers us in the same speedy manner.

Foreseeing our needs and our prayers, He so arranges providence that before the need actually arises He has supplied it...

Before the trial assails us He has armed us against it. 

This is the promptitude of omniscience, and we have often seen it exercised. 

Before we dreamed of the affliction which was coming, the strong consolation which was to sustain us under it had arrived. 

What a prayer-answering God we have!

The second clause suggests the telephone. 

Though God be in heaven and we upon earth, yet He makes our word, like His own word, to travel very swiftly, 

When we pray aright we speak into the ear of God. 

Our gracious Mediator presents our petitions at once, and the great Father hears them and smiles upon them.

Grand praying this! Who would not be much in prayer when he knows that he has the ear of the King of kings?

This day I will pray in faith, not only believing that I shall be heard, but that I am heard...

Not only that I shall be answered, but that I have the answer already. 

Holy Spirit, help me in this!

~Charles Spurgeon~

Jacob in Despondency!

Gen 42:36  And Jacob their father said unto them, Me have ye bereaved of my children: Joseph is not, and Simeon is not, and ye will take Benjamin away: all these things are against me.

It did seem so indeed. Joseph, his best and dearest son, had long been lost.
 
Simeon was kept behind in Egypt.

And now they wanted to take Benjamin away...Benjamin, his youngest son, the child of his old age, and next to Joseph, his best beloved son.

Yet by the very things that looked so dark - God was about to bring him peace and comfort in his latter days.

All things were even now working together for his good.

Simeon was to be restored to him.
 
Benjamin must indeed go away but he would come safe back.

And Joseph, the long-lost Joseph, would be found again...happy and prosperous, a great man in Egypt, but the same in heart as ever, his dutiful and loving son.

Little did Jacob know what all that was taking place, meant.

Little did he know the goodness of God toward him, when he said in his despondency, "All these things are against me!"

We too are sometimes disposed to say the same.

There are times when all things seem against us.

One trouble comes upon another.

We can see no help and no hope.

Nothing but trouble seems around us...
 
Nothing but trouble seems before us...

We feel quite broken-hearted.

All these things are against me! exactly expresses the state of our minds.

But is it the truth?

It was not the truth in Jacob's case.
 
All things seemed against him but they were not really against him.

So it is in many other cases.

Things are not so bad as they seem.
 
Nay, perhaps when all seems as bad as can be - at that very time a happy change may be just about to come...and by means of the very things that look so dark!

When Jacob had found his long-lost son and was happily settled in the land of Egypt and lived there in peace and plenty and honor, free from anxiety and with all his children round him...then perhaps then he remembered his own desponding words, "All these things are against me!"

If so, what must he have thought of them then?

If we look at things with no eye to God then we shall often be ready to say, "All these things are against me!"

But if we remember God then surely we cannot say so...at least if we have any knowledge of Him, any faith in Him, any love to Him.

Put aside the thought of God, and forget for a moment the end of Jacob's history, and how dark do his circumstances appear at the time of his using these words!

On the other hand, remember God...see His hand in all that had happened from the first sad loss of Joseph, all through the ups and downs of Joseph's life in Egypt...

And all through the famine in the land of Canaan, up to the very moment when Jacob's heart failed him, but when God was just about to make him happy.

See all in this light and how different does it look!

We who know the history to its end, and how God was ordering all for good, and how soon the happy discovery was to be made...can hardly bear to hear Jacob say, "All these things are against me!"
 
We do indeed feel for the aged man in his distress and despondency...but we know that all is on the point of turning out happily.

A little more waiting in anxious fear, and Jacob will feel and speak very differently:

Joseph my son is yet alive! I will go and see him before I die."

Oh! How different it is, to see and to believe.

Jacob was full of comfort when the happy end was come and we can think of him with pleasure all through his troubles because we know the end that was to be.

But this is sight, not faith.

If we walked by faith and not by sight, and if our faith were strong...then we would find comfort and encouragement even before deliverance came.

For we know that without our Father, not a sparrow falls to the ground.

And have we no words of His to encourage us, no promises, sure and steadfast?

Why do we not believe, even when we cannot see?

Why are we so downcast, when circumstances seem against us, though all the while we profess to believe in God as ordering all things and as hearing prayer?

How weak is our faith, and how prone to fail!

How apt are we to let dark appearances obscure all the light of God's Word!

If we could see then we would believe.
 
True faith believes even when it cannot see.

There is a sentence in the Book of God which alone should keep the believer from ever feeling as Jacob did.

It is this: Rom 8:28  And we know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them who are the called according to his purpose.

One of the most striking instances of the truth of these words was the very man who said, "All these things are against me!"

The words themselves seem to show that often the things do not seem as if they were for good.

We know...as if it were said, notwithstanding all appearances to the contrary...yet we know.

And again, "that God causes all things to work together for good"...as if many of the things seemed in themselves to be working for evil, but were, nevertheless, joining in with other things and making up with them the whole design of God, and thus would turn to good in the end.

Thus, even in this most comforting verse there is room for faith.

Indeed, without some measure of faith.. we cannot get comfort from the Word of God at all.

It is the believer's happy privilege to know that, even when all things seem against him...they are not so really.
 
For he has committed himself and all his concerns into his Father's hands and He is all-wise, all-powerful, all-loving, and has promised that He will never fail those who trust in Him.

He will surely keep His word.

He will...never forget them, never overlook them, and never cease to care for them.

He will...watch over them for good, preserve them from all real evil, and bless them continually.

Things may look dark at times, but it is only the outside of things that we can see.

However things may look, the same unchanging God and Father is still ordering all...

Nothing can happen without Him, and He does all things well!

Let us keep fast hold of this truth, and we shall never say, "All these things are against me!"

Rather, in the darkest trouble we shall see some light, some tokens of the hand of love that is doing all, some gracious sign that God has not forsaken us.

And we shall gratefully join in the words of the Psalmist, "Though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil for You are with me; Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me."

Christian! When all things seem against you, believe that God is thus dealing with you in order to humble you and lead you to Himself.

He pities you even while you are far off from Him.

He would bring you near.

Perhaps these very troubles are God's appointed means to restore you.

Seek Him from the very midst of them, from the very depth of pain, sorrow, anxiety, and fear.

Seek Him in earnest prayer.

Seek His mercy, His pardon, His grace.
Plead the Name of Jesus.

Approach the mercy-seat through Him.
 
Ask that His blood may take away your guilt.

Cast yourself upon the mercy of God in Christ and then beseech Him to help you in every trouble.

Will He refuse your prayer?

Surely not!

All His Word says that He will hear and answer and bless His redeemed people.

If trouble is thus the means of bringing you to God...then it will prove your greatest blessing.

Then you will never say, All these things are against me, but rather, Before I was afflicted I went astray but now have I kept Your word!

It is good for me that I have been afflicted that I might learn Your statutes."

Francis Bourdillon, 1864

For A Rational Man To Be So Attached To A Bubble, Is A Most Irrational Thing!

Worldliness is an undue attachment to this world. 

It is living for this world...its riches, its honor, its joys and its cares. 

It is living by the principles of this world: greed, covetousness, deceit and lust.

Nothing is more dangerous to the souls of men than the love of the world.
 
Nothing more effectually chokes out the influence of the gospel in a man's heart than the cares of this world.
 
Nothing is more difficult to avoid than an undue attachment to this world.

Therefore, John sets these four words up as a beacon. 

They stand in blazing letters to warn us of great danger: "LOVE NOT THE WORLD!"

Beloved, this world and all that it offers, is no more than a bubble that soon must burst!

Your money, your farms, your houses, your influence, your families...everything here is temporary. 

It will all vanish away!

We laugh at the small child who cries when the bubbles he is playing with burst. 

But, for a rational man to be so attached to a bubble, is a most irrational thing!

What fools they are who love and seek this world!

I cannot warn you enough of the danger of worldliness...of loving, seeking, and living for this world!

Are you God's child?

Are you risen with Christ?

Do you live in the hope of eternal glory?

Then count this world to be a dead thing.
 
Live no longer for this world.
 
Set your heart on things above.
 
Live above this pile of rubbish that must soon burn!
 
Live to do the will of God, seek the glory of Christ, further the gospel of the grace of God, and serve the people of God. 

Quit seeking those things for which unbelieving men live...

And seek those things which are above...life, immortality, and glory.

~Don Fortner~

Faith Awaits God's plans

                                                                                
It came to pass, after a while, that the brook dried up, because there had been no rain in the land.

Week after week, with unfaltering and steadfast spirit, Elijah watched that dwindling brook;

Often tempted to stagger through unbelief, but refusing to allow his circumstances to come between himself and God.

Unbelief sees God through circumstances, as we sometimes see the sun shorn of his rays through the smoky air;

But faith puts God between itself and circumstances, and looks at them through Him.

And so the dwindling brook became a silver thread;

And the silver thread stood presently in pools at the foot of the largest boulders;

And then the pools shrank.

The birds fled; the wild creatures of field and forest came no more to drink; the brook was dry.

Only then, to his patient and unwavering spirit, "the word of the Lord came, saying."

Arise, get thee to Zarephath.

Most of us would have got anxious and worn with planning long before that.

We should have ceased our songs as soon as the streamlet caroled less musically over its rocky bed;

And with harps swinging on the willows we should have paced to and fro upon the withering grass, lost in pensive thought.

And probably, long ere the brook was dry, we should have devised some plan, and asking God's blessing on it, would have started off elsewhere.

Alas! we are all too full of our own schemes, and plans, and contrivings.

And if Samuel does not come just when we expect, we force ourselves, and offer the burnt-offering (i Sam. xiii.12).

This is the source of untold misery.

We sketch out our programme, and rush into it;

And only when we are met by insuperable obstacles do we begin to reflect whether it was God's will, or to appeal to Him.

He does often extricate us, because His mercy endureth forever;

But if we had only waited first to see the unfolding of His plans, we should never have found ourselves landed in such an inextricable labyrinth;

And we should never have been compelled to retrace our steps with so many tears of shame.

One of the formative words for all human lives, and especially for God's servants, was given by God to Moses, when He said: See that thou make all things according to the pattern showed to thee in the mount (Heb. viii. 5).

Moses was eager to do God's work, and the best skill amongst the people was at his command; but he must not make a single bell, or pomegranate, or tassel, or fringe, or curtain, or vessel, except on God's pattern, and after God's ideal.

And so he was taken up into the mount, and God opened the door into his own mind, where the tabernacle stood complete as an ideal;

And Moses was permitted to see the thing as it lived in the thought and heart of God.

Forty days of reverent study passed by; and when he returned to the mountain-foot, he had only to transfer into the region of actual fact that which had been already shown to him, in pattern, on the mount.

Surely some such thought as this must have been in the mind of our blessed Lord, when He said: "The Son can do nothing of Himself, but what He seeth the Father do" (John v. 19).

So utterly had He emptied Himself that He had abandoned even His own schemes and plans;

He lived a planless life, accepting each moment the plan which His Father unfolded before Him;

And being confident that that plan would lead Him on to greater and ever greater works, until the world should marvel at the splendor of the results—rising from Gethsemane and Calvary, through the broken grave, to the Ascension Mount, and the glory of His second Advent.

Oh, mystery of humiliation, that He who planned all things should will to live a life of such absolute dependence!

And yet, if He lived such a life, how much more will it become us;

How much anxiety it will save us; and to what lengths of usefulness and heights of glory will it bring us!
 
Would that we were content to wait for God to unveil His plan, so that our life might be simply the working out of His thought, the exemplification of His ideal!

Let this be the cry of our hearts: Lord, show me Thy way; teach me to do Thy will:

Show me the way wherein I should walk, for unto Thee do I lift up my soul.

~F. B. Meyer~

Bow Down; Be Lifted Up

This is tantamount to a promise: if we will bow down, the LORD will lift us up. 

Humility leads to honor; submission is the way to exaltation. 

That same hand of God which presses us down is waiting to raise us up when we are prepared to bear the blessing. 

We stoop to conquer. 

Many cringe before men and yet miss the patronage they crave...

But he that humbles himself under the hand of God shall not fail to be enriched, uplifted, sustained, and comforted by the ever-gracious One. 

It is a habit of Jehovah to cast down the proud and lift up the lowly.

Yet there is a time for the LORD's working. 

We ought now to humble ourselves, even at this present moment; 

And we are bound to keep on doing so whether the LORD lays His afflicting hand upon us or not. 

When the LORD smites, it is our special duty to accept the chastisement with profound submission. 

But as for the LORD's exaltation of us, that can only come "in due time," and God is the best judge of that day and hour. 

Do we cry out impatiently for the blessing? 

Would we wish for untimely honor?

What are we at?

Surely we are not truly humbled, or we should wait with quiet submission. 

So let us do. 

~Charles Spurgeon~

At Home With GOD

Rev 7:14  And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

Rev 7:15  Therefore are they before the throne of God, and serve him day and night in his temple: and he that sitteth on the throne shall dwell among them.

Rev 7:16  They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more; neither shall the sun light on them, nor any heat.

Rev 7:17  For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters: and God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.

Happy, happy place!

Happy, happy people!

All happy...perfectly happy, happy forever!

They are "before the throne of God"...

They see Him but they are not afraid, for He loves them — and they love Him.

They have no sin now to make them afraid nor even the fear that they may sin...for they cannot sin now.

All sin is gone forever!

There is no such thing in that place... none in their hearts, none in any around them.

Are they afraid?

No!

They rejoice to be before the throne of God.

To be with God is their happiness.

Heaven itself would be no place of happiness to them, without God.

To be with Him, to see Him face to face, to love Him perfectly, and to rejoice in His love to them...this is their eternal bliss!

Perfect love casts out fear (1 John 4:18).

They knew that in a measure before but now they know it fully.

They are not idle there.

They serve God.

But that service is not like service on earth, in which there is usually difficulty and fatigue.

Whatever God gives them to do...that they do.

They love to do it and they can do it; for He gives them both the will and the power.

They are never unwilling, never tired, never weak.

All that they have to do they do with joy and gladness.

Adoring and praising and singing and serving...it is all happiness.

They serve Him day and night.

They need no sleep. No one sleeps there.

Indeed, there is no night, such as we have on earth;

And probably "day and night" only means always, without leaving off, as we now leave off our work when night comes and we need sleep.

In His temple.

Not that we are to think there is any temple or church there, such as we have here below.

Heaven will be all one great temple of God and the saints will n

But serving God "in His temple" seems to show what kind of service it is...nothing worldly, like work upon earth, but all holy and spiritual.

And He who sits on the throne shall dwell among them.

He will always be with them and they will always be with Him.

That is now their eternal home.

They have arrived at the Father's house, of which Jesus spoke: In My Father's house are many mansions.

I am going to prepare a place for you (John 14:2).

They have reached their Father's house now.

They used often to think of it and perhaps to long for it and now they have reached it, and they find it better than all their hopes!

Many of them were poor in this world but they are not poor now.

They used to suffer from hunger, perhaps...but now "they shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more.

They went through many hardships of different kinds but all their hardships and troubles are over now!

Neither shall the sun strike them, nor any heat.

They have one who will take care of them and supply all their needs.

For the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall feed them, and shall lead them unto living fountains of waters.

The Lamb - the Lamb of God - the Lord Jesus Christ, He will take care of them!

He was slain for them, like a lamb - as an atoning sacrifice!

He will take care of them, like a shepherd.

Nothing shall ever hurt them.

The good Shepherd is with them.

He will feed them...that is, He will give them all they need or desire.

He will "lead them unto living fountains of waters" - that is, He will refresh them and cheer them and make them eternally happy.

They are safe in the fold now...the Heavenly fold.

They had sorrows upon earth, perhaps many and great sorrows...but they will never sorrow more.

They used often to weep-but they will never weep again, for God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes.

Not a tear will they ever shed-not a sorrow will ever distress their hearts-not one painful thought of past trouble will come to interfere with their perfect happiness.

God Himself will comfort them.

God Himself will dry their tears.

God Himself will make them happy.

How did they get to that blessed place?

Not by their own goodness, their own holiness, their own sufferings, their own patience.

Not by anything whatever of their own.

They "washed their robes-and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

Therefore are they before the throne of God!

Not one of them got there in any other way.

Christ was their Savior.

He redeemed them by His blood and they through grace, believed and were saved.

There is no other way to Heaven.

He said Himself, "I am the way, the truth, and the life...No man comes unto the Father, but by Me" (John 14:6).

He is the way for us all-the only way.

If ever we would join those blessed ones above, if ever we would stand before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed with white robes and palms in our hands...then we too must wash our robes and make them white in the blood of the Lamb!

We must cast away all self-righteous hopes and go to Jesus as our Savior, mourning for our sins, feeling our lost estate, and placing our whole hope and trust in Him who died upon the cross.

He Himself has said, "Him that comes to Me I will never cast out!" John 6:37

My sheep hear My voice, I know them, and they follow Me.

I give them eternal life, and they will never perish...ever!

No one will snatch them out of My hand! John 10:27-28

Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?

Shall trouble or hardship or persecution or famine or nakedness or danger or sword?

No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through Him who loved us.

Rom 8:35  Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or peril, or sword?

Rom 8:36  As it is written, For thy sake we are killed all the day long; we are accounted as sheep for the slaughter.

Rom 8:37  Nay, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him that loved us.

Rom 8:38  For I am persuaded, that neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,

Rom 8:39  Nor height, nor depth, nor any other creature, shall be able to separate us from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

~Francis Bourdillon, ~1864