The Holy of Holies of the Word of God

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

Sanctify them by Your truth. Your Word is truth…And for their sakes I sanctify Myself, that they also may be sanctified by the truth. – John 17:17, 19

Here we look into the heart of Jesus, as He sets out in order His desires and requests before His Father on our behalf. Here inspiration lifts her veil, and we behold truth face to face. Our text lies somewhere near the middle of the prayer; it is the heart of it. Our Lord’s desire for the sanctification of His people pervades the whole prayer; but it is gathered up, declared, and intensified in the one sentence: “Sanctify them through Thy truth: Thy Word is truth.” How invaluable must the blessing of sanctification be when our Lord, in the highest reach of His intercession, cries: “Sanctify them!” In sight of His passion, on the night before His death, our Savior lifts His eyes to the great Father, and cries in His most plaintive tones, “Father, sanctify them.” He asks this sanctification of God the Father Himself, for He alone it is who can sanctify His people. The place whereon we stand is holy ground, and the subject whereof we speak demands our solemn thought. Come, Holy Spirit, and teach us the full meaning of this prayer for holiness!

“For their sakes I sanctify Myself.” Our Lord’s sanctification was His consecration to the fulfillment of the Divine purpose; His absorption in the will of the Father. “Lo, I come to do Thy will, O God.” In this sense our interceding Lord asks that all His people may, by the Father, be ordained and consecrated unto holy service. The prayer means, “Father, consecrate them to Thine own self; let them be temples for Thine indwelling, instruments for Thy use.” He would have each of us consecrated unto the Lord, designated and ordained for divine purposes. We are not the world’s, else might we be ambitious; we are not Satan’s, else might we be covetous; we are not our own, else might we be selfish. We are bought with a price, and hence we are His by whom the price is paid. We belong to Jesus, and He presents us to His Father, and begs Him to accept us and sanctify us to His own purposes. Do we not most heartily concur in this dedication? Do we not cry, “Father, sanctify us to Thy service?” I am sure we do if we have realized our redeemed condition. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1890.cfm

This Wonderful Prayer

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

“Sanctify them through Thy truth: Thy Word is truth.”-John 17:17

Our Lord Jesus prayed much for His people while He was here on earth. He made Peter the special subject of His intercession when He knew that he was in extraordinary danger. The midnight wrestlings of the Son of man were for His people…He poured out His soul in life before He poured it out unto death.

In this wonderful prayer, our Lord, as our great High Priest, appears to enter upon that perpetual office of intercession which He is now exercising at the right hand of the Father. Our Lord ever seemed, in the eagerness of His love, to be anticipating His work. Before He was set apart for His life-work, by the descent of the Holy Ghost upon Him, He must needs be about His Father’s business; before He finally suffered at the hands of cruel men, He had a baptism to be baptized with, and He was straitened till it was accomplished; before He actually died, He was covered with a bloody sweat, and was exceeding sorrowful even unto death; and in this case, before He in person entered within the veil, He made intercession for us. He never tarries when the good of His people calls for Him. His love hath wings as well as feet: it is true of Him evermore, “He rode upon a cherub, and did fly: yea, He did fly upon the wings of the wind.” O beloved, what a friend we have in Jesus! so willing, so speedy to do for us all that we need. Oh that we could imitate Him in this, and be quick of understanding to perceive our line of service, and eager of heart to enter upon it. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1890.cfm

The Prayer of the Spouse

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“Until the day break, and the shadows flee away, turn, my Beloved, and be thou like a roe or a young hart upon the mountains of Bether.” – Song of Songs 2:17

We have to wait, brothers and sisters; we have to wait in the darkness, cheered here and there with the light from a golden lamp that glows with the light of God. The world lieth in darkness, but we are of God, little children, therefore this must be our prayer to our Well-beloved, “Come unto us.” “Turn to me, O my Beloved, for Thou hast turned away from me, or from Thy Church. Turn again, I beseech Thee. Pardon my lukewarmness, forgive my indifference. Turn to me again, my Beloved. O Thou Husband of my soul, if I have grieved Thee, and Thou hast hidden Thy face from me, turn again unto me! Smile Thou, for then shall the day break, and the shadows flee away. Come to me, my Lord, visit me once again.” (And make this your prayer also): “Great Master, sweetly-beloved One, come over the mountains of division, and come quickly, like a roe or a young hart. Come easily, come unexpectedly; as roes and harts let no man know when they will come, so come Thou unto me.” …Have you never felt an influence steal over you which has lifted you out of yourself, and made you go as on burning wheels with axles hot with speed, where before you had been sluggish and dull? Our Well-beloved can come and visit us, all on a sudden, without any trouble to Himself. It cost Him His life’s blood to come to earth to save us; it will cost Him nothing to come just now to bless us. Remember what He has already done; for, having done so much, He will not deny you the lesser blessing of coming to you. Are you saved by His grace? Then do not think that He will refuse you fellowship with Himself. Pray for it now… “Come to me, my Beloved, over the hills of division; come as a roe or a young hart;” and He will come to you. ~ C.H.Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2477.cfm

A People Separated Unto God

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, Sovereignty of God, The Father, The Holy Spirit 2 Comments

Wherefore come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you… – 2 Corinthians 6:17

The more sin abounds in the world, the more ought the Church of God to seek after the strictest holiness. If ever there was an age that wanted back again the sternest form of Puritanism, it is this age. If ever there was a time when we needed the old original stamp of Methodists, we need them now, a people separated unto God, a people that have nothing to do but to please God and to save souls, a people that will not in any way bow themselves to the fashions of the time. For my part, I would like to see a George Fox come back among us, ay, Quaker as he was, to bear such a testimony as he did bear in the power of the Spirit of God against the evils of his time. God make us to feel that now, in the dark, we cannot be even as lenient as we might have been in brighter days towards the sin that surrounds us! Are any of you tempted into “society” so-called, and into the ways of that society? Every now and then, those who read the papers get some little idea of what is going on in “society.” The stench that comes from “society” tells us what it must be like, and makes us wish to keep clear of it. The awful revelations that were once before made, which caused us to be sick with shame and sorrow, might be made again; for there is just the same foulness and filthiness beneath the surface of the supposed greater decency. O Christian people, if you could but know, as the most of you ought not to know, how bad this world is, you would not begin to talk about its wonderful improvements, or to question the doctrine of human depravity…Keep yourselves to your Lord, and hear you this voice sounding through the darkness, the voice of a wisdom that sees more than you see, “Come out from among them, and be ye separate, saith the Lord, and touch not the unclean thing; and I will receive you, and will be a Father unto you, and ye shall be my sons and daughters, said the Lord Almighty.” “Until the day break, and the shadows flee away,” lift your hands to heaven, and pledge yourselves to walk a separated pilgrim life, until He cometh before whose face heaven and earth shall flee away. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2477.cfm

Courage, Brethren

Sherry Christian Life 3 Comments

Until the day break, and the shadows flee away… – Song of Songs 2:17

Men who have been shipwrecked will give each other a hand, and say, “Brother, mayhap we shall escape after all.” Now that it is midnight all around, let every Christian give his fellow-soldier a grip of his hand. Courage, brothers; the Lord has not forgotten us. We are in the dark, and cannot see Him; but He can see us, and He knows all about us, and maybe He will come, walking on the stormy waters in the middle watch of the night when our little bark seems ready to be sunk beneath the waves by the boisterous wind… “Come, brothers, let us cheer up. The Lord hath appeared to one and another of us. He hath given to some of us the light of His countenance, and He is coming back to welcome us all unto Himself. Let us not be dismayed; our glorious Leader forgets not the weakest and feeblest of us, neither is any part of the battlefield beyond the reach of the great Captain’s eye. He sees which way the struggle is going, and He has innumerable reserves, which He will bring up at the right time. I seem to hear the music of His horse’s hoofs even now. He is coming who shall turn the scale in the worst moment of the conflict, for the battle is the Lord’s, and He will deliver the enemy into our hand. Let no man’s heart fail him because of yonder Goliath; the God who has raised up men to slay the lion and the bear, will yet find a David and a smooth stone to kill this mighty giant. Wherefore, brothers, be of good courage.”

One of the best things to do in the dark is to stand still and keep our place. “Until the day break and the shadows flee away,” let us keep our place, and firmly maintain our position… It is dark, very dark, so we just stop where we are, in steadfast confidence in the Lord who has placed us where we are. We are not going to plunge on in a reckless manner, we mean to look before we leap; and as it is too dark to look, we will not leap, but will just abide here hard by the cross, battling with every adversary of the truth as long as we have a right hand to move in the name of the Almighty God, “until the day break, and the shadows flee away.” ~ C.H.Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2477.cfm

The Eternal Name

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You who are King of kings and Lord of lords, we worship You. Before Jehovah’s awful throne we bow with sacred joy.

Sermon Text

Patient Endurance with Hopeful Watching

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

I can (endure) all things through Christ which strengtheneth me. – Philippians 4:13

Watch and pray… – Mark 13:33

We are here, like soldiers on guard, waiting for the dawn. It is night, and the night is deepening; how shall we occupy ourselves until the day break, and the shadows flee away?

Soldiers of the cross, you must not wish to avoid these shadows; He who has called you to this service knew that it would be night time, and He called you to night duty; and being put upon the night watch, keep at your post. It is not for any of us to say, “We will desert because it is so dark.” Has not the thought sometimes crossed your mind, “I am not succeeding; I will run away”? Have you not often felt, like Jonah, that you would go to Tarshish that you might escape from delivering your Master’s message? Oh, do not so! The day will break, and the shadows flee away; and until then, watch through the night, and fear not the shadows. Play the man, remembering through what a sevenfold night your Master passed, when, in Gethsemane, He endured even to a bloody sweat for you. When, on the cross, even His mid-day was midnight, what must have been the darkness over His spirit? He bore it; then bear you it. Let no thought of fear pass over your mind; or, if it does, let not your heart be troubled, but rise above your fear until the day break, and the shadows flee away. Be of good courage, soldiers of Christ, and still wait on in patient endurance.

Let there be hopeful watching. Keep your eyes towards the East, and look for the first grey sign of the coming morning. “Watch!” Oh, how little is done of this kind of work! We scarcely watch as we ought against the devil; but how little do we watch for the coming of our Master! Look for every sign of His appearing, and be ever listening for the sound of His chariot wheels. Keep the candle burning in the window, to let Him see that you are awake; keep the door on the latch, that when He cometh you may quickly open unto Him. Hopefully watch until the day break, and the shadows flee away. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/2477.cfm