APRIL 30
SUGGESTED READING: COLOSSIANS 3:1–13
Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth. For ye are dead, and your life is hid with Christ in God (Col. 3:2–3).
Jesus Christ said, “And because iniquity shall abound, the love of many shall wax cold” (Matt. 24:12). Has yours?
The Cross of Jesus Christ calls us to pattern our lives after the example of Jesus. There is no sanctified life that is not crucified, or dead, to the lure of this present age. We are not saved and sanctified to see our Lord glorified in our way of thinking, but for God to take us victoriously along the pathway of obedience with Him. The characteristic of the sanctified life is obedience.
If you want to be spiritually weak and submissive to the spirit of this age, you will be popular. Carnal men and women would rather magnify the idea of the Cross than submit to the humiliation of the Cross. May God get us to the point of submission!
PRAYER THOUGHT: Forgive me, Lord, when I trust too much in material things and displease You.
SUGGESTED READING: COLOSSIANS 1:14–17
And he is before all things, and by him all things consist (Col. 1:17).
What kind of zeal have you? If it is only “moral zeal,” then beware! But if your zeal, passion, and determination—yea, every fiber of your body—are motivated by a personal and passionate devotion to Jesus Christ, you are a humble worker of God.
Our Lord wants us to see this important distinction. Everything done from any motive other than a passionate devotion to the Lord, who died that He might save us by washing us from our sins through the shedding of His own blood, is unacceptable to Him. Hatred of sin is not enough. Even love for our fellowman falls short.
Jesus does not call us to be moral reformers. We are to concentrate our efforts on one thing, and the apostle Paul echoes it for us: “For I determined not to know any thing among you, save Jesus Christ, and him crucified” (1 Cor. 2:2).
My right to myself must cease. My zeal in doing God’s work my way must cease. My desire to take God’s truth my way must cease. And my practice of preaching Jesus Christ my way must cease. I must magnify the Cross of Christ. My zeal and fervor must be lost in devotion to our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Jesus, be the Lord of my life and the Master of my mind.
SUGGESTED READING: MATTHEW 20:20–29
But Jesus answered and said, Ye know not what ye ask. Are ye able to drink of the cup that I shall drink of, and to be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with? They say unto him, We are able. And he saith unto them, Ye shall drink indeed of my cup, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with: but to sit on my right hand, and on my left, is not mine to give, but it shall be given to them for whom it is prepared of my Father (Matt. 20:22–23).
How often has the Lord come with the cup He drank and offered it to you, and you told Him, “Now, Lord, I have far too much to do. I cannot drink the cup. I cannot go through the baptism of your sufferings just now. People are dying and I must go out and save them my way. I am consumed with a desire and love for the lost.”
“Are you able to drink of My cup?” again Jesus asks.
What did Jesus do for the first thirty years of His life to save the lost? Absolutely nothing! He remained closeted up in silence. No one ever heard of Him, except the few at His birth and those who were confounded by His brilliance as the lad in the Temple. Then for three blazing years that have staggered time and eternity, He lived and died so that the gospel might be preached.
The world was not lost while the disciples waited in the Upper Room for Pentecost. God grant that we will drink the cup He wants us to drink—the cup of humble submission to Him.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Despite my eagerness to win the lost, Father, guide me in holy and humble submission to the will of the Savior.
SUGGESTED READING: ACTS 5:17–32
… We ought to obey God rather than men (Acts 5:29b).
You know exactly in what respects you have refused to obey the Lord and persisted in having your own way. When He said, “Drink with Me,” you responded, “No, Lord, I want to have the pattern and imprint of my church. I want to go their way. I want to live as they live and adhere to their decisions in my life.” Instead of having fellowship with Him, you have preferred the fellowship of other Christians.
The Lord stands beside you very patiently, but in judgment as you refuse Him and obey others.
Do you want to know Paul’s attitude about what other Christians thought of him? He said, “With me it is a very small thing that I should be judged of you, or of man’s judgment …” (1 Cor. 4:3a).
Is this true with you, brother and sister? If the Christian crowd you mingle with judge you, so what? Are they your god, or is the crucified Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ? We are called to faithfulness to the Lord Jesus Christ. Any movement or person that contradicts Jesus, God will blast to pieces.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Deliver me from obeying other people instead of You.
SUGGESTED READING: HEBREWS 2:6–18
But every man is tempted, when he is drawn away of his own lust, and enticed (James 1:14).
Temptation may best be called “that wild reach of possibility” which stretches one to fame or infamy; and the higher we walk, the more severe the temptation. Temptation simply indicates the sublime nobility of the character God is building within us.
It is impossible to be free from temptation; but temptation is not sin. If temptation were sin, then the Lord Jesus Christ was a sinner.
Two kinds of temptation are mentioned in the New Testament. First, we read of the temptation by Satan, such as that experienced by our Lord Jesus Christ. Secondly, we notice the temptation arising from the old disposition of sin within us (see James 1:14). We would avoid a lot of confusion if we clearly distinguished between these two types of temptation.
We are always responsible for temptation from our old disposition, because the atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ could radically alter that disposition if we would let Him. But we are not responsible for the temptation from Satan. That sort comes by the express permission of God, who at times seems to say to the Devil, “Do your worst. He that is in them is greater than you!”
PRAYER THOUGHT: Father, help me to resist Satan, knowing that he will flee from me.
SUGGESTED READING: MATTHEW 4:1–4
And when the tempter came to him, he said, If thou be the Son of God, command that these stones be made bread (Matt. 4:3).
This passage of Scripture describes a kind of socialistic temptation. Basically, Satan was saying: “Put man’s needs first. Abolish hunger! Make Your appeal to their bodies, make Your appeal to their desire for fellowship, and the world will crown You king.”
No one understood better the poignant needs of poverty and human suffering than our Lord. Remember that Jesus had come to be a Savior and King, and you will see at once the subtle appeal in this temptation of Satan.
The temptation to provide bread and abolish hunger occurred more than once in our Lord’s life (see John 6:13–15). People instantly wanted to enthrone Jesus because of His ability to feed thousands. Jesus resisted. His goal was not to be a popular social leader, merely providing for physical needs.
World brotherhood was not His mission on earth, either (see Matt. 12:46–50). All men are not His brothers; only those who do His will and His Father’s will are Christ’s brothers. Jesus has deep compassion for all of humanity, and He has promised the communion of saints. But we cannot assume that He will gather all people into His fellowship.
The temptation to cater merely to the social needs of mankind was subtly alluring to Jesus Christ. It continues to allure modern Christians and the church.
PRAYER THOUGHT: With Christ, I cry, “Get thee behind me, Satan,” for I am committed to doing God’s will.
SUGGESTED READING: MATTHEW 4:5–7
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. For we have not a 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. 4:14–15).
Jesus was tempted to amaze humanity, daze people’s senses, and overrule the natural laws of earth. Satan knew the power of the miraculous to gain the attention of human beings. Anything supernatural instantly sways us. But our Lord did not need to prove that He was the Son of God. He vehemently opposed giving “signs” to convince His critics of His mission on earth (see Matt. 12:38–39).
Jesus Christ could command forces that other men knew nothing about. To dazzle humanity by miracles would have been as easy for Him as breathing; but He restrained His miracle-working power.
Many modern Christians say, “If God would only perform signs and wonders, we would have a sweeping awakening.” There are actually people who promote this concept. They seek supernatural gifts, with a desire to do “signs and wonders” among us; they seek to “amaze humanity” with their power.
In spite of all the warnings of Scripture, God’s people are so easily led astray by signs and supernatural wonders. We must beware!
PRAYER THOUGHT: Spare me, Lord, from the onslaughts of Satan and of all earthly cults deceived by him.
SUGGESTED READING: MATTHEW 4:8–11
Then saith Jesus unto him, Get thee hence, Satan: for it is written, Thou shalt worship the Lord thy God, and him only shalt thou serve (Matt. 4:10).
Satan tempted Jesus to compromise with the evil that is in our world—with Satan himself. The Devil sought from the King of kings and Lord of lords a supremacy and sovereignty in this world.
Satan said that he could give the kingdoms of this world and the glory of them to Jesus if He would worship him. What was Satan’s goal as he tempted our Master on this occasion? I believe he wanted to abolish hell. If he could convince the Son of God to worship him, Satan thought, he might spare himself from everlasting doom.
Satan is still trying to abolish hell. He wants all of us to banish hell from our beliefs and teachings. But Jesus would not, and we must not also.
Our Lord is opposed to all compromise with evil (Luke 14:28–33). We compromise with evil whenever we try to satisfy our desires at the expense of doing the will of God. The only people who do not see the enormous danger of compromising with evil are those who are ignorant of the snares of Satan.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Oh, I shun compromise with evil. I want the Holy Spirit to empower me to overcome evil with good.
SUGGESTED READING: 1 JOHN 3:1–11
He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil (1 John 3:8).
Our Lord’s life challenges us to maintain an intense narrowness in our spiritual lives. I agree that walking arm in arm with the world is highly beneficial for the civilizing of a community. But I believe that civilization is not Christianity.
Modern Christians’ craze for social refinement is effacing the rugged, sterling truth of the gospel of Jesus Christ. The fear of poverty makes many a Christian live in harmony with the world. The church that allows this worldly practice will, of course, gain the respect of this world; but if repentance does not come soon, that church will hear those words of Jesus, “… I never knew you: depart from me, ye that work iniquity” (Matt. 7:23).
First John 3:8 clearly shows us that Jesus came to our world of sin to destroy the works of the Devil, not to renovate them. The Christian who yields to this temptation to gain supremacy in this world will be found ultimately to bear the scent of a spiritual corpse, with a horrible stench of evil corruption.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Strengthen me that I may not be defeated by the cares of this life and the deceitfulness of riches.
SUGGESTED READING: MARK 1:28–39
And in the morning, rising up a great while before day, he went out, and departed into a solitary place, and there prayed (Mark 1:35).
This incident occurred after our Lord experienced a tremendous spiritual victory over Satan. He had endured the fierce onslaught of Satan in the wilderness. But after this ordeal “the angels ministered unto Him” (Mark 1:13). There is a peril in assuming that we are strong after a victory, and Jesus realized this fact.
I wonder what was the subject of the Lord’s early dawn experience in prayer? Jesus went with such easy power through life; what did He do in those solitary moments with God? The fame of the Lord Jesus Christ grew steadily; people brought all the diseased and the demon-possessed to Him, and He delivered them. Yet, in the midst of such a marvelous career of relieving and blessing people in need, He spent practically the whole night in prayer.
Do you realize that after eminent success in God’s work, there is more need for prayer than when we are at the foothills of a struggle for survival? The moments of victory and success are more dangerous than moments of darkness and depression.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Dear Father, may the spiritual success I experience be fortified with seasons of earnest prayer.
SUGGESTED READING: 1 THES SALONIANS 1
We give thanks to God always for you all, making mention of you in our prayers (1 Thess. 1:2).
We do not need to be told that it is necessary to pray for our needy friends. It is obvious that the unsaved and those in difficult circumstances need our prayers.
But what about those who are full of sunshine, whose dispositions seem sweet with heavenly blessing? Do we pray for them as we should, or do we simply stand in awe of their joy and victory? Do we neglect to agonize in prayer for them? When our souls have been lifted into the presence of God and when the Spirit of God has stirred our aspirations at a camp meeting or convention, how much time do we spend in prayer for those who ministered to us?
When the ultimate truth is told, we may find to our horror that, though we have enjoyed and listened to men and women of God as they blessed our spiritual lives, we have been spiritually selfish. We have allowed ourselves to think that, because we have been blessed by their ministry, we would be presumptuous to pray for them. This is a snare of Satan.
Have we spent so much time in the exuberance of shouting, thanksgiving, and joy that we have forgotten that the safest place for us is on our knees?
PRAYER THOUGHT: Bless Your servants today, Lord.
SUGGESTED READING: JOSHUA 1:1–9
Have not I commanded thee? Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the LORD thy God is with thee whithersoever thou goest (Josh. 1:9).
Every religion, except Christianity, reveres the past. Christianity alone makes the best in the past seem poor, compared to the present—and the present seem poor, compared with what is yet to be.
When God announced to Joshua the death of His great servant Moses, did He announce plans for a memorial? Did He instruct Joshua to write a book of remembrance of Moses? No! God told Joshua, “Now, therefore arise, go … !” (Josh. 1:2). Moses was a mighty man of God; but a living babe is of more use in God’s plans than a dead Moses.
For the saint of God there is no time as good as the present, unless it be the future. Even the splendid cry, “Back to the Bible,” is not a call to return to the past; it springs from our need to return to the source of the mighty ocean of God’s grand ideas for you and me.
Beware of people who worship reminiscences of the “good old times.” Those who indulge in sentimentality do not savor the things of God. Every period of time in the Bible was better than the preceding age; and Christians know that the best is yet to be.
PRAYER THOUGHT: O God, lead and guide as You did Your servants Moses and Joshua.
SUGGESTED READING: ROMANS 8:22–25
For we are saved by hope: but hope that is seen is not hope: for what a man seeth, why doth he yet hope for? (Rom. 8:24).
When I tell you that the best is yet to be, I mean this in its profoundest sense, not in its obvious sense. God is not outdone, defeated, and beaten within the confines of human history. Only because I am confident that He is bringing His own purposes to pass, in His own way, can I say that every age of time is better than the last. But this reality is discernible only to the Spirit of God within me, not to the spirit of man within me.
The Bible stirs up an intense and unquenchable hope that an age of time is coming on this earth, inconceivably wonderful, when all that we have ever dreamed will fade into silly fancies beside the reality.
This will be when Christ reigns among us. Satan, the antagonist of God and the accuser of the saints, will be imprisoned by God and will be unable to harm or disturb the saints of God. The colossal pretensions of the Antichrist will be a thing of the past as the resurrected saints take active share in the manifestation of the kingdom of God on earth.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Father, my hope for the future is completely in You.
SUGGESTED READING: PSALM 31:1–20
Thou shalt hide them in the secret of thy presence from the pride of man: thou shalt keep them secretly in a pavilion from the strife of tongues (Ps. 31:20).
When human thought is naive, life looks simple, and history may be explained in ways that are simple and glib. For instance, some so-called scholars talk about “evolution.” This system of thought is a simple and obvious development of modern reasoning. But when you and I talk about the Fall of man, the evolutionists think we are absurd.
However, when we are made to face life as it is, and history as it is recorded in Genesis, and the human soul in all its tragic features and triumphs, our minds are staggered. Our thinking then becomes subdued, and the human spirit is forced to cry out, “Oh, that I knew where I might find Him that I might even come before His presence!”
PRAYER THOUGHT: O Lord, keep me in the security of Your presence and the shelter of Your love.
SUGGESTED READING: ISAIAH 24:13–23
And it shall come to pass in that day, that the LORD shall punish the host of the high ones that are on high, and the kings of the earth upon the earth (Isa. 24:21).
According to the Holy Bible, there is a coming day of judgment. God reveals in the Scriptures that He has brought about many “doom days,” but the final Doomsday has not yet come.
Because God has had several doomsdays in the history of the world, and things have gone afterwards as they went before, men and women have slipped into the notion that the final Doomsday will be simply like all the others. They seem to forget that the Bible states that the final Doomsday fixes the character of each individual forever, either in heaven or hell.
Destiny! Every person makes his own destiny. God’s merciful judgment days warn us of the way our eternal character is developing and of the destiny that faces us.
The voice of Scripture earnestly warns us to heed the voice of God in these intermediate judgment days, lest, when the final Judgment Day comes, we will have no deliverance.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Prepare me, O Lord, for Judgment Day.
SUGGESTED READING: LUKE 7:24–30
For I say unto you, Among those that are born of women there is not a greater prophet than John the Baptist: but he that is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he (Luke 7:28).
What is prophecy? The prevalent popular notion is that a prophet is one who predicts things; and consequently, he is thought to be a kind of sanctified gypsy. As a result, delusions have played havoc within Christian communities.
From the Bible’s point of view, a prophet is one who teaches under the direct influence of God, with a predictive ability to aid in proclaiming the moral purposes of God. No prophet of God, from the beginning of time until now, ever fully understood all he has said.
A prophet of God is a flesh-and-blood mortal whom God uses. Some glibly say that a prophet is “inspired of God.” But this can be very misleading, because the word inspiration is made to mean just about anything—from a rise of high emotional feeling to the sublime beauty of the baptism in the Holy Spirit. The prophets of the Bible were not people who spoke and wrote merely from pious reflection. This is a popular idea today. Prophets of God were—and are—men and women moved by the Holy Spirit!
PRAYER THOUGHT: Move upon Your servants, God, so that they deliver to us the Word of God without fear or favor.
SUGGESTED READING: LUKE 18:1–8
I tell you that he will avenge them speedily. Nevertheless, when the Son of man cometh, shall he find faith on the earth? (Luke 18:8).
From Genesis to the Book of Revelation, the Bible has spoken of a coming One — not a prophet, but One of whom all the prophets spoke.
Prophecies concerning Jesus were clear and obscure before He came to earth. Likewise, after He came the first time, prophesies concerning His coming again in the skies have been clear and obscure. Clearness and obscurity are the very characteristics of divine prophesy. To the pure in heart, the prophesies are clear, because the pure in heart know the way that passes knowledge. But to the lost, the prophecies are obscure.
Obscurity is common to human intelligence, because human intelligence can only perceive what has taken place in its own experience, not that which makes it what it is.
Those with a pure heart know that Jesus Christ is coming again in rapturous glory. They are looking for His coming. But those who piece together the prophecies concerning Him, by mere human intelligence and logic, will suffer from delusion and a final eclipse of faith.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Keep me ready for Your coming, Lord, and enable me to heartily work for You until Your coming.
SUGGESTED READING: HEBREWS 11:23–28
Esteeming the reproach of Christ greater riches than the treasures in Egypt: for he had respect unto the recompense of the reward (Heb. 11:26).
Wherever one’s hopes are founded, there will that person’s idea of prosperity be. And whatever the soul conceives to be prosperity will become that person’s measurement of hope.
All of the Christian’s hopes spring from being with God; consequently, all prosperity is measured from that Source. The world looks upon what we call prosperity as a way of failure, but we know that any so-called prosperity apart from God would be disastrous.
Jesus Christ prospered in the way of God. As He walked alone with God, He was bruised and despised. Yet the heavenly Father worked out His good pleasure in His own inscrutable way. Now you and I follow in Jesus’ steps and the pleasure of the Lord prospers in our hands. What is that pleasure? Making disciples—“seeing His seed” multiplied in His children, through regeneration and entire sanctification.
Eternal prosperity begins in the “innermost of the innermost,” as we are alone with God; and it works out to the outermost, as we do God’s will each day. It is a spiritual prosperity, realized as we are transfigured into the beauty of holiness.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Like Moses and Jesus, I esteem the will of God more than the way of the world.
Thou wilt show me the path of life: in thy presence is fulness of joy; at thy right hand there are pleasures for evermore (Ps. 16:11).
The Christian’s walk with God is a way of inexplicable rapture. All that we Christians call bliss and pleasure in our fellowship with mankind is but the faintest shadow of the unspeakable pleasure of the communion we have with God.
Scripture uses the language of human relationships to suggest the unspeakable pleasure of eternal fellowship with God. Just as the language of lovers, or of a husband and wife, is imponderable to the unloving nature, so the language of the heart in communion with God is imponderable to those who are not in a like relationship.
Jesus said, “And this is life eternal, that they might know thee the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom thou hast sent” (John 17:3). This is eternal life: increasing knowledge of the unfathomable God and His only begotten Son. What a sharp contrast to our ordinary conception of heaven, with its rewards and crowns! Simply to know Him—this is eternal pleasure!
PRAYER THOUGHT: O Lord, the very thought of eternal fellowship with You is beyond my comprehension.
SUGGESTED READING: LUKE 23:39–45
To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God (Rev. 2:7b).
Paradise is a beautiful word. It stands for a spiritual reality conveyed by no other word. It refers to a city that “had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof” (Rev. 21:23).
This eternal Paradise begins even now in those who walk with God. The soul who has personal communion with God knows that a Paradise has begun and will lead to a greater blessedness, more grand than one can imagine. This is not a false dream. The human heart longs for the real and visible paradise of God.
With God we have the glory that Jesus had, here and now—the glory of His holiness. But then we will be changed into His image, following the Lamb “whithersoever He goeth” (Rev. 14:4). How can we conceive what it shall be like?
PRAYER THOUGHT: Oh, the bliss and wonder of heaven. I long for it!
He maketh me to lie down in green pastures: he leadeth me beside the still waters (Ps. 23:2).
Divine guidance is a subject as old as the Bible. There is nothing more important to the Christian.
The Bible has made the way of divine guidance so simple that only fools make a mistake in it. Only when we get wise in our own conceits, in our own experiences, or in listening to our own convictions, do we go astray spiritually.
Psalm 23 tells us that “the Lord is my Shepherd.” He leads us in the right way. It is the way that leads out into the green pastures, beside the still waters, and among the glorious hills of God.
God puts despair along any way that does not lead to Him. Discouragement rises from following self-love, and from nothing else. We get discouraged because we do not get our way.
Isaiah 42:4 tells us that the Lord “shall not fail nor be discouraged,” and neither should His saints. For God will always be our Guide!
PRAYER THOUGHT: Heavenly Father, be my Guide. Lead me. Take complete control.
SUGGESTED READING: MATTHEW 7:21–29
Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, that shall he speak: and he will show you things to come (John 16:13).
Jesus did not promise we would comprehend everything after we are entirely sanctified. He did suggest that the Holy Spirit will lead us into all truth from the point of sanctification, though growing pains will be characteristic of a sanctified life.
Sanctification is the point at which the soul is married to the Lord and the Holy Spirit fills us. God’s will is that all of us should be saved (1 Tim. 2:4) and sanctified (1 Thess. 4:3). There is no obscurity about these statements of His will. They are clear signposts on our spiritual journey, indicating where we can expect divine guidance to begin.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Holy Spirit, guide me in the will of God.
SUGGESTED READING: PHILIPPIANS 2:12–16
For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of his good pleasure (Phil. 2:13).
If you think that your obedience, your repentance, or your morality is going to get you nearer to Jesus Christ, you are making a mistake. Intimacy with Christ comes only by abandoning yourself to Him.
Your crying to God will not save you. Surrendering your possessions will not save you. You may give God everything you like and still be damned. God never asked you to give Him anything but your will.
The only barrier to your salvation is yourself. The same is true with entire sanctification. God has put salvation and sanctification within your grasp, for Jesus has done everything in your behalf. Yet all depends on whether you submit your will to Him.
Some people are more concerned about being in earnest than they are about being in God’s will.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Thank You, Lord God, for adequate provisions for my salvation—all for my seeking and asking!
SUGGESTED READING: JOHN 4:1–26
Jesus answered and said unto her, If thou knewest the gift of God, and who it is that saith to thee, Give me to drink; thou wouldest have asked of him, and he would have given thee living water (John 4:10).
Two fundamental gifts of God are provided through the atonement of Jesus Christ—salvation and sanctification. These are for you to take, not for you to gain. Nobody but an abject spiritual pauper can get saved or sanctified. Oh, God, deliver us from thinking that the energy of the flesh can save us!
And may God prevent anyone from being tripped by the profound simplicity of Christ! It is easy to be saved or sanctified. All depends upon our obeying God’s will, when it is clearly stated.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Heavenly Father, give me faith to fully accept salvation and sanctification as a free gift of Your love to me.
SUGGESTED READING: 2 THES SALONIANS 2:1–12
And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness (2 Thess. 2:11–12).
May God grant that we may get rooted and grounded in spiritual truth. Of those who will not accept the truth, the Bible says: “God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie.” God has done this very thing. Those who love not the truth as it is in Christ, and everybody who is living for Christ by “experiences,” will be void of God’s guiding voice.
May God bring us to that glorious rest in Him and to that simplicity of faith. Satan can imitate the Holy Spirit in everything but one. Experiences? The Devil will give you thousands of them. But he can never produce the result the Holy Spirit produces—a holy character that glorifies Jesus.
I have made my choice forever,
I will walk with Christ my Lord;
Naught from Him my soul can sever,
While I’m trusting in His word.
I the lonely way have taken,
Rough and toilsome though it be,
And although despised, forsaken,
Jesus, I’ll go through with Thee.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Yes, I have made my choice forever. To God be all the praise!
SUGGESTED READING: 1 JOHN 2:1–15
And he is the propitiation for our sins: and not for ours only, but also for the sins of the whole world (1 John 2:2).
Sin is not merely immorality. Sin is deeper, more massive, more awful.
Sin reflects a disposition that absolutely refuses to let God rule. Sin rules in both the “bad man” and the “good man,” until the Holy Spirit has invaded a person with the new disposition of holiness.
Brothers and sisters, we are playing fools around the Cross of Christ to think that Jesus came just to challenge us to set our wrongs right. He did not. He became sin so that He might destroy sin in us.
When a Christian takes on the role of a moral reformer, he is a traitor to the Cross of Jesus Christ, because the Christian’s mission is not to change other people’s sin. Jesus Christ is the substitute for the sin of the world.
May God the Holy Spirit convict us of sin, and destroy the so-called “Christian experience” some of us have.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Spirit of God, rid me of the tendency to be satisfied with less than Your best.
SUGGESTED READING: ROMANS 3:19–23
For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God (Rom. 3:23).
Sin is universal. Yet the Cross of Jesus can destroy the disposition of sin. The Cross can give us a clean heart; its power can invade and indwell us, making us masters over every thought and desire.
Thus, the salvation of Jesus Christ is not for just “an experience.” God save us from this “experience” business! Sin must be eradicated and strangled to death. An absolute surrender must be made to God—we must yield ourselves to a full invasion of God. There is no deliverance from sin until we seek the Cross of Jesus Christ, who became sin for us. Holy character is the result of God’s work—a character pure in secret and in public.
We must be leagues above moral integrity. We must be stamped, not only by moral integrity, but by the supernatural character of God, made available to us by the atonement of Jesus Christ.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Lord, create true character within me—a character pleasing to You!
SUGGESTED READING: PSALM 51:1–12
To the end he may stablish your hearts unblamable in holiness before God, even our Father, at the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ with all his saints (1 Thess. 3:13).
Sin is blindness. One of the greatest crises of our day is that we are contented with easy satisfaction in our spiritual lives. We are content with moral fastidiousness. If we are to get at the heart of the religion of the Cross, we will have to forget such religious trivialities. We must be “unblamable in holiness before God.”
May God stop the preachers with moral measuring rods. Down with them! We need broken-hearted preachers with an awful conviction of sin, preachers who cry, “My God! My God! Against Thee, Thee only have I sinned!”
Christ did not come to put our relationships right with one another; He came to put our relationships right with Him. To accomplish this, He must eradicate the old disposition of sin and fill the cleansed heart with His blazing, incandescent glory.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Establish true holiness in my heart and life so that I will be ready for the coming of Christ.
SUGGESTED READING: 1 JOHN 2:1–12
My little children, these things write I unto you, that ye sin not. And if any man sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous (1 John 2:1).
What we need to hear is not something new, but the very thing to which we have always listened and yet paid no attention. God wants to stagger our convictions and lead us to a point of spiritual maturity where our convictions will go to the winds. It is Christ, not our convictions, that saves us.
There is nothing grander, nothing more majestic than when the Lord comes into our souls. The gates of hell cannot prevail against us. Nothing can pluck us out of the hand of God. No external power can make us backslide. (We “are more than conquerors,” and if we backslide, it is by our own choice.)
John wrote his first epistle to people who say there is no such thing as sin after we are saved. Sin is a persistent danger, even to the Christian.
Sin is anarchy against God’s Word. So if you sin, you are a traitor to God—even if you hold very bold convictions. If your “holiness experiences,” your “healing,” or your “testimony” are not based on the eradication of the old carnal nature, you have nothing to do with Calvary.
PRAYER THOUGHT: Lord, let me submit even my convictions to You.
SUGGESTED READING: LUKE 16:13–17
And he said unto them, Ye are they which justify yourselves before men; but God knoweth your hearts: for that which is highly esteemed among men is abomination in the sight of God (Luke 16:15).
What is most highly esteemed among men and women today? The god of this present age is “my mastery over myself.”
Many attempt to face our Lord Jesus Christ with moral self-righteousness, proud to think they have subjected themselves to an exacting moral law. But Christ never looks at a person’s external life. Christ often treats with a light hand the moral lepers, yet puts the most tremendous denunciations on those who seem to be all right.
Your disposition of “my right to myself” must go. Do not think your salvation consists of your morality, your holiness, your experiences, or anything else based on this disposition of self-rule.
God grant that you may be crucified with Christ. There is no hope anywhere under heaven but in the Cross of Jesus. God made Him to be sin for your sake, because sin is your usual disposition. It must be removed here and now, or you will be damned.
PRAYER THOUGHT: To You I cling, Lord Jesus. You are my only hope of salvation.