promises

Courage from the “Hereafter.”

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises, Sovereignty of God, The Father Leave a comment

Nevertheless I tell you, hereafter you will see the Son of Man sitting at the right hand of Power, and coming on the clouds of heaven.” Matthew 26:64

Ah, LORD, You were in Your lowest state when before Your persecutors You were made to stand like a criminal! Yet the eyes of Your faith could see beyond Your present humiliation into Your future glory. What words are these, “Nevertheless – hereafter!” I would imitate Your holy foresight, and in the midst of poverty, or sickness, or slander, I also would say, “Nevertheless – hereafter.” Instead of weakness, You have all power; instead of shame, all glory; instead of derision, all worship, Your cross has not dimmed the splendor of Thy crown, neither has the spit marred the beauty of Your face. Rather, You are more exalted and honored because of Your sufferings.
So, LORD, I also would take courage from the “hereafter.” I would forget the present tribulation in the future triumph. Help me by directing me into the Father’s love and into Your own patience, so that when I am derided for Your name I may not be staggered but think more and more of the hereafter, and, therefore, all the less of today. I shall be with You soon and behold Thy glory. Wherefore, I am not ashamed but say in my inmost soul, “Nevertheless – hereafter.” ~ Charles Spurgeon | Faith’s Checkbook

The Great Heart-Searcher

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, confession of sin, promises, repentance, Sovereignty of God 2 Comments

“Know well the condition of your flocks, and pay attention to your herds.” Proverbs 27:23

Every wise merchant will occasionally hold a stock-taking, when he will cast up his accounts, examine what he has on hand, and ascertain decisively whether his trade is prosperous or declining. Every man who is wise in the kingdom of heaven, will cry, “Search me, O God, and try me;” and he will frequently set apart special seasons for self-examination, to discover whether things are right between God and his soul. The God whom we worship is a great heart-searcher; and of old His servants knew Him as “the Lord who searches the heart and tries the reins of the children of men.” Let me stir you up in His name to make diligent search and solemn trial of your state, lest you come short of the promised rest. That which every wise man does, that which God Himself does with us all, I exhort you to do with yourself this evening. Let the oldest saint look well to the fundamentals of his piety, for grey heads may cover black hearts: and don’t let the young professor despise the word of warning, for the greenness of youth may be joined to the rottenness of hypocrisy. Every now and then a cedar falls into our midst. The enemy still continues to sow tares among the wheat. It is not my aim to introduce doubts and fears into your mind; no, but I shall rather hope that the rough wind of self-examination may help to drive them away. It is not security, but carnal security, which we would kill; not confidence, but fleshly confidence, which we would overthrow; not peace, but false peace, which we would destroy. By the precious blood of Christ, which was not shed to make you a hypocrite, but that sincere souls might show forth His praise, I beseech you, search and look, lest at the last it be said of you, “Mene, Mene, Tekel: you are weighed in the balances, and are found wanting.”~Charles Spurgeon

He Repulses No One

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, Sovereignty of God, The Father 3 Comments

All that the Father giveth Me shall come to Me; and him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out.  – John 6:37

Is there any instance of our LORD’s casting out a coming one? If there be so, we would like to know of it; but there has been none, and there never will be. Among the lost souls in hell there is not one that can say, “I went to Jesus, and He refused me.” It is not possible that you or I should be the first to whom Jesus shall break His word. Let us not entertain so dark a suspicion.

Suppose we go to Jesus now about the evils of today. Oh, this we may be sure. He will not refuse us audience or cast us out. Those of us who have often been and those who have never gone before, let us go together, and we shall see that He will not shut the door of His grace in the face of any one of us. “This man receives sinners,” but He repulses no one. We come to Him in weakness and sin, with trembling faith, and small knowledge, and slender hope; but He does not cast us out. We come by prayer, and that prayer broken; with confession, and that confession faulty; with praise, and that praise far short of His merits; but yet He receives us. We come diseased, polluted, worn out, and worthless; but He does in no wise cast us out. Let us come again today to Him who never casts us out. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

Faiths Checkbook

This My Lord Knows

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises, Sovereignty of God 25 Comments

“I know their sorrows.”-Exodus 3:7

The child is cheered as he sings, “This my father knows”; and shall not we be comforted as we discern that our dear Friend and tender soul-husband knows all about us?

He is the Physician, and if He knows all, there is no need that the patient should know. Hush, thou silly, fluttering heart, prying, peeping, and suspecting! What thou knowest not now, thou shalt know hereafter, and meanwhile Jesus, the beloved Physician, knows thy soul in adversities. Why need the patient analyze all the medicine, or estimate all the symptoms? This is the Physician’s work, not mine; it is my business to trust, and His to prescribe. If He shall write His prescription in uncouth characters which I cannot read, I will not be uneasy on that account, but rely upon His unfailing skill to make all plain in the result, however mysterious in the working.

He is the Master, and His knowledge is to serve us instead of our own; we are to obey, not to judge: “The servant knoweth not what his lord doeth.” Shall the architect explain his plans to every hodman on the works? If he knows his own intent, is it not enough? The vessel on the wheel cannot guess to what pattern it shall be conformed, but if the potter understands his art, what matters the ignorance of the clay? My Lord must not be cross-questioned any more by one so ignorant as I am.

He is the Head. All understanding centres there. What judgment has the arm? What comprehension has the foot? All the power to know lies in the head. Why should the member have a brain of its own when the head fulfils for it every intellectual office? Here, then, must the believer rest his comfort in sickness, not that he himself can see the end, but that Jesus knows all. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

http://bible.christiansunite.com/Morning_and_Evening/chme0814.shtml

Truth Will Be Victorious

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, repentance, salvation, Sovereignty of God 18 Comments

…and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land. But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return… – Isaiah 6:12,13

Certain of you have heard the gospel preached plainly and honestly, and yet you have never received it: is there not creeping over you a fatal indifference? Are not your hearts turning to stone? Possibly you are professors of religion, and yet you do not feel the power of it; what does this mean? If you are not a praying people, nor a holy people, and yet you are a professing people, what an awful doom awaits you!… Oh, shall it be so? Will you die? Dear hearers, I should not like to meet one of you at that day of judgment and have to feel that I preached you into a greater blindness than you might have known. Oh, be converted! Turn ye, turn ye, why will ye die? May God in infinite mercy speak to you that you may believe in Jesus now, lest that should come upon you which is spoken of by the prophet, “Behold, ye despisers, and wonder, and perish!”

The tree is leveled by the axe; but weep not despairing tears, for it shall sprout again, for life is still in it. Even so the Church must live; truth must be victorious; purity must conquer, the Christ must reign. Behold, He cometh with clouds, and every eye shall see Him. Reject Christ if you will to-day, Oh ye who think yourselves so exceeding wise, but there is a people who love Him, a secret people who cling to Him; and when He comes, as come He must ere long, they will welcome Him and partake in His glory. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1844.cfm

The Truth Haters

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God 6 Comments

And He said, Go, and tell this people, Hear ye indeed, but understand not; and see ye indeed, but perceive not. – Isaiah 6:9

(Israel’s) terrible sin lay in this, that they were willingly blinded by the light which ought to have been to them a help to see Christ, and they were hardened by those very truths which ought to have melted them. They became more and more adverse to Christ through beholding in Him such a character as ought to have won their hearts. To the prophet’s teaching they were entirely dead. A specimen of this we find in the succeeding chapters of Isaiah. Israel and Syria attacked Ahaz, whose reign followed those of Uzziah and Jotham. The prophet came and said to Ahaz, “Take heed, and be quiet; fear not, neither fainthearted for the two tails of these smoking firebrands.” Ahaz was assured that God would help him if he would but trust in Him; but instead of doing so, the king determined to petition for the help of the great king of Assyria, with the result in the long run that “the king of Assyria came unto him and distressed him, but helped him not.” Isaiah, to confirm his message, bade the king choose any sign either in the depth or in the height above; but the infidel king replied, “I will not ask, neither will I test Jehovah.” He had so defiantly cast off allegiance to the true God that he would not even accept a sign, though it was left to his own choice. Thus Isaiah’s message was rejected though put in the most winning form, for the hearts of the people were blinded and hardened so as to choose the way of destruction. Ultimately, as you know, the Assyrians carried the whole people away; for they had rejected God’s message willfully, and wrath came upon them. What a grievous task to be called to preach to such a people!

“Hear the just law, the judgment of the skies!
He that hates truth shall be the dupe of lies.”

~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1844.cfm

The Power of Christ’s Sacrifice

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation 7 Comments

Then flew one of the seraphims unto me, having a live coal in his hand, which he had taken with the tongs from off the altar: And he laid it upon my mouth, and said, Lo, this hath touched thy lips; and thine iniquity is taken away, and thy sin purged. – Isaiah 6:6,7

Then came the best part of the vision for Isaiah. At the glorious sight, he felt, “Woe is me, for I am undone, I am stricken dumb. I can never speak again, for my lips are unclean, and I dwell among an unclean people.” Then, swift as lightning flew a seraph, bringing a coal more burning than himself from off the altar of sacrifice, wherewith he touched the prophet’s lip. Beloved, this is what we need. We need to feel the atonement laid home to us, to feel the power of the great sacrifice of Christ, to hear a voice saying within our spirit, “Thine iniquity is put away, and thy sin is purged.” Though that live coal must have blistered the lip which it covered, yet it made it eloquent. Common fire would destroy the organs of speech, but the fire of sacrifice does not so, but it unlooses a grateful tongue, and helps a grateful heart to tell the love immense, unsearchable, which offered itself upon the altar of sacrifice, that holiness and love might save the sinner. Our peace comes from the Holy, Holy, Holy One, who is just, and yet forgives His people’s sin. Brother, if you are to proclaim the glory of your Lord, you must feel the sacrificial coal applied to the place where your impurity is most seen, even to your lips; you must know that you are forgiven; for your conviction that you are clean before God will give you confidence in telling out to others the story of the cross.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1844.cfm