Tuesday: I Endorse This with All My Heart
WEEK 51
TUESDAY
I ENDORSE THIS WITH ALL MY HEART
John 7:37-39
We continue to look at the steps in finding the Holy Spirit.
Sixth, having come so far along with God, shall I pull back and spoil it all by refusing to give that last thing, myself? No, I do give that last thing, myself! Since God is not merely giving me this or that but is giving the Divine Self, how can I answer that divine self-giving except by my own self-giving? I cannot ask for God to give all to me if I give things to God, things but not myself.
Most Christians are canceled out, not because they don’t give, but because they don’t give all. They give, but they don’t give up. Yet how gladly we should offer our all in exchange for God’s all! It will be the most sensible thing we’ve ever done. A sacrifice? Nonsense. The sacrifice is to withhold, for then you are sacrificing your spiritual effectiveness, your spiritual joy, your very self. Only as we lose our lives, do we find them. We are obeying a spiritual law that works with mathematical precision.
Seventh, and since I “receive the promise of the Spirit through faith” (Gal 3:14), I now take this gift of God by faith. Faith is receptivity toward God. Faith is not a talisman that brings certain things because of the faith. Faith is an attitude toward God that makes it possible for God to work. If God gave to us without our faith, it would mean imposing something on us without our cooperation. Faith is cooperating with God. It is saying yes to God’s yes, affirming God’s affirmations.
A man gave a check to a minister in financial difficulties. When the minister took it to the bank, the cashier asked him to endorse it. So he wrote on the back of it, “I endorse this with all my heart.” Faith writes across the promises of God, “I endorse this with all my heart.” A woman brought to me one of my books and, instead of asking me to autograph it, asked me if I would endorse it. I wrote, “I endorse this book,” and signed my name. Faith, by endorsing God’s promises, cashes in on them.
O Christ, your promises are your character extended in open invitation. So when I have faith in your promises, I have faith in your character. I endorse your character with all my heart. Amen.
AFFIRMATION FOR THE DAY: “Faith is an affirmation and an act that bids eternal truth be fact.”*
*No published source was found for this quotation, which is widely attributed to English poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge (1772–1834).