Christian Life

Have You This God-Given Life?

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God Leave a comment

He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him. – John 3:36

Because I live, ye shall live also. – John 14:19

Blessed is that man who hath everlasting life, who is made a partaker of the divine nature, who is born again from above, who is born of God by a seed which remaineth in him; for he is the man upon whom the second death hath no power, who shall enjoy life eternal when the wicked go away into everlasting punishment.

We have now to ask each of you whether you have received it. Have you been born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God? Was there a time with you when you passed from death unto life, or are you abiding in death? Have you the witness in yourself that you have been operated upon by a divinely spiritual power? Is there something in you which was not once there, not a faculty developed by education, but a life implanted by God Himself? Do you feel an inward craving unknown to carnal minds, a longing desire which this world could neither excite nor gratify? Is there a strange sighing for a land as yet unseen, of which it is a native, and for which it yearns? Do you walk among the sons of men as a being of another race, not of the world, even as Christ was not of the world? Can you say, with the favoured apostle, “We know that the Son of God is come, and hath given us an understanding, that we may know Him that is true, and we are in Him that is true, even in His Son Jesus Christ. This is the true God, and eternal life.” Oh! then, thank God for this, and thank God yet more that you have an infallible guarantee for this, and thank God yet more that you have an infallible guarantee that your life shall be continued and perfected, for so saith the text, “Because I live, ye shall live also.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0968.cfm

The Soul’s Highest Life

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, The Father, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. – Romans 8:6

Christ is our life, but He works in us through His Holy Spirit, who dwelleth in us evermore. We know that this life very much consists in union with God. “For to be carnally minded is death; but to be spiritually minded is life and peace. Because the carnal mind is enmity against God: for it is not subject to the law of God, neither again can be. So then, they that are in the flesh cannot please God.” Death as to the body consists in the body being separated from the soul; the death of the soul lies mainly in the soul’s being separated from its God. For the soul to be in union with God is the soul’s highest life; in His presence it unfolds itself like an opening flower; away from Him it pines, and loses all its beauty and excellence, till it is as a thing destroyed. Let the soul obey God, let it be holy, pure, gracious, then is it happy and truly living; but a soul sundered from God is a soul blasted, killed, destroyed; it exists in a dreadful death; all its true peace, dignity, and glory, are gone; it is a hideous ruin, the mere corpse of manhood. The new life brings us near to God, makes us think of Him, makes us love Him, and ultimately makes us like Him. My brethren, it is in proportion as you get near to God that you enter into the full enjoyment of life-that life which Jesus Christ gives you, and which Jesus Christ preserves in you. “In His favour is life.” Psa 30:5 “The fear of the Lord is a fountain of life.” Pro 14:27 To turn to God is “repentance unto life.” To forget God is for a man to be “dead whilst he liveth.” To believe the witness of God is to possess the faith which overcometh the world. “He that believeth on the Son of God hath the witness in himself: he that believeth not God hath made Him a liar, because he believeth not the record that God gave of His Son. And this is the record, that God hath given to us eternal life, and this life is in His Son. He that hath the Son hath life; and he that hath not the Son of God hath not life.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0968.cfm

Alive from the Dead

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Father 1 Comment

And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath He quickened together with Him, having forgiven you all trespasses… – Colossians 2:13

“In the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die,” was the Lord’s threatening to our first parent, who was the representative of the race. He did eat of the fruit, and since God is true, and His word never fails, we may be sure of this, that in that selfsame day Adam died. It is true that he did not cease to exist, but that is quite another thing from dying. The threatening was not that he should ultimately die, but “In the day thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die;” and it is beyond all doubt that the Lord kept His word to the letter. If the first threatening was not carried out, we might take liberty to trifle with all others. Rest assured, then, that the threat was on the spot fulfilled. The spiritual life departed from Adam; he was no longer at one with God, no more able to live and breathe in the same sphere as the Lord. He fell from his first estate; he had need if he should enter into spiritual life to be born again, even as you and I must be. As he hides himself from his Maker, and utters vain excuses before his God, you see that he is dead to the life of God, dead in trespasses and sins. We also, being heirs of wrath even as others, are through the fall dead, dead in trespasses and sins; and if ever we are to possess spiritual life, it must be said of us, “And you hath He quickened.” We must be as “those that are alive from the dead.” The fall brought universal death, in the deep spiritual sense of that word, over all mankind; and Jesus delivers us from the consequences of the fall by implanting in us spiritual life. By no other means can this death be removed: “He that believeth on the Son hath everlasting life: and he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him.” The work of regeneration, in which the new life is implanted, effectually restores the ruin of the fall, for we are born again, “not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God which liveth and abideth forever.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0968.cfm

The Spiritual Life

Sherry Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

Because I live, ye shall live also. – John 14:19

Life, what is it? We know practically, but we cannot tell in words. We know it, however, to be a mystery of different degrees. As all flesh is not the same flesh, so all life is not the same life. There is the life of the vegetable, the cedar of Lebanon, the hyssop on the wall…Animal life rises far above the experience and apprehension of the flower of the field. Then there is mental life, which we all of us possess, which introduces us into quite another realm from that which is inhabited by the mere beast. To judge, to foresee, to imagine, to invent, to perform moral acts, are not these new functions which the ox hath not? Now, let it be clear to you, that far above mental life there is another form of life of which the mere carnal man can form no more idea than the plant of the animal, or the animal of the poet. The carnal mind knoweth not spiritual things, because it has no spiritual capacities. As the beast cannot comprehend the pursuits of the philosopher, so the man who is but a natural man cannot comprehend the experience of the spiritually minded. Thus saith the Scripture: “The natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.” There is in believers a life which is not to be found in other men-nobler, diviner for education cannot raise the natural man into it, neither can refinement reach it; for at its best, “that which is born of the flesh is flesh,” and to all must the humbling truth be spoken, “Ye must be born again.” ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0968.cfm

Always Looking unto Jesus

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, The Holy Spirit Leave a comment

Yet a little while, and the world seeth Me no more; but ye see Me: because I live, ye shall live also. – John 14:19

Here and there among the crowds of the sightless there were a few chosen men who had received spiritual sight; Christ had been light to them, He had opened their blind eyes, and they had seen Him as the world had not seen Him…We who have the same sight still see Him. Read carefully the words of the verse before us: “Yet a little while, and the world seeth Me no more; but ye see Me.” It is a distinguishing mark of a true follower of Jesus that he sees his Lord and Master when He is not to be seen by the bodily eye; he sees Him intelligently and spiritually; he knows his Lord, discerns His character, apprehends Him by faith, gazes upon Him with admiration as our first sight of Christ brought us into spiritual life, for we looked unto Him and were saved, so it is by the continuance of this spiritual sight of Christ that our spiritual life is consciously maintained. We lived by looking, we live still by looking. Faith is still the medium by which life comes to us from the life-giving Lord. It is not only upon the first day of the Christian’s life that he must needs look to Jesus only, but every day of that life, even until the last; his motto must be, “Looking unto Jesus, the author and finisher of our faith.” …Faith is the life-look. We must never think that we live by works, by feelings, or by ceremonies. “The just shall live by faith.” We dare not preach to the ungodly sinner a way of obtaining life by the works of the law, neither dare we hold up to the most advanced believer a way of sustaining life by legal means. We should in such a case expect to hear the apostle’s expostulation, “Are ye so foolish? Having begun in the Spirit, are ye now made perfect by the flesh?” Our glorifying is that our life is not dependent on ourselves, but is safe in our Lord, as saith the apostle, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless, I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself for me.” Because He lives, we live, and shall live forever. God grant that our eye may ever be clear towards Jesus, our life. May we have no confidence but in our Redeemer; may our eyes be fixed upon Him, that no other object may in any measure or degree shut out our view of Him as our all in all. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0968.cfm

A Shout of Homage and of Prayer

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, salvation, Sovereignty of God Leave a comment

…and they that followed, cried, saying, Hosanna; Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord…Hosanna in the highest. – Mark 11:9,10

I want you to notice in our text, that our Savior was received with the shout of Hosanna! The best interpretation I can give is-“Save, oh, save! Save, oh, save!” Different nations have different ways of expressing their good will to their monarchs. A Roman would have shouted, “Io triumphe!” We sing, “God save our gracious Queen.” The Persians said, “O King, live for ever.” The Jews cried, “Hosanna!” “Save,” or, “God save the King!” The French have their “Vivas,” by which they mean, “Long live the man.” Hosanna is tantamount to all these. It is a shout of homage, welcome, and loyalty. It wishes wealth, health, and honor to the king. In the Saxon we say, “Hurrah”; in Hebrew, “Hosanna.” That mighty shout startled all the streets of the old city: “Hosanna, Hosanna, the King is come. Save Him, O Lord! Save us through Him! Long live the King!” While it was a shout of homage, it was also a prayer to the King. “Save, Lord; save us, O King! O King, born to conquer and to save, deliver us!” It was, moreover, a prayer for Him-“God save the King, God bless and prosper His majesty.” Prayer also shall be made for Him continually; and daily shall He be praised.” We never cease to pray, “Thy kingdom come; Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.” Let us then cry, Hosanna, making it at once a loyal shout; a prayer to our King, and a prayer for Him. All these things appear in the benediction which follows: “Blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord; Hosanna in the highest.”

Would it be amiss if we were to indulge in a hearty shout for our King? May we never grow enthusiastic? May we never overleap the bounds of prim propriety? Shall we never cry Hallelujah! Shall no Hosannas burst from our lips? Surely, if our King will come into the midst of His church again, and end these black days of doubt, we must and will shout, or else the very stones will cry out, Yes, O Lord Jesus, Thou shalt have our Vivas: we will shout, “Long live the King! ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2196.cfm

Be Not Like the Fool

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life 2 Comments

The fool hath said in his heart, There is no God. They are corrupt, they have done abominable works, there is none that doeth good. – Psalm 14:1

I see the ungodly man putting this poor fleeting world before the eternal world to come; therein he is a fool; but let me take heed that I in no measure imitate him. Let me never in my business live as though to make money; to get a competence, to earn the wherewithal to eat and drink, were the first thing with me. Let me not fall into his error, but ever seek first the kingdom of God and His righteousness and believe that other things shall be added to me. The ungodly man disregards God. God is not in all his thoughts. He saith in his heart, “No God.” Now when I know that the ungodly man does that, it should be a warning to me not to forget the Lord or depart from Him in any measure. Alas, we are all of us more or less atheistic. How little of our life is given to God! You who love and fear Him are not always near to Him, though He is always near to you. Do you never enter upon your enterprises without Him? When you begin your business with Him, are you not apt to forget Him in the middle passage of it? Or when you have gone on to the very center of a work with Him, are you not liable to leave Him ere you close? Is not this to learn the way of the wicked and to be like them in wandering away from the living God? To have God always with us, to lean hourly upon Him, and to feel each moment that He is all in all to us-this is the true condition in which our minds ought to be continually. The atheism of the outside world should warn us against the inward godlessness of our naturally atheistic hearts. Be you of another spirit; be courteous, cultivate the grace of cheerfulness and good temper as a Christian. The moroseness of the churl should enforce upon you the duty of godly gentleness. The Lord make us wise and prudent, and from the errors of others may we learn to steer our own course aright ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0983.cfm