The Right State for Celestial Instructions

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

And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am He that liveth, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen. – Revelation 1:17,18

In order to complete the cure of His servant our Lord went on to give him fuller instruction in that very matter which had overpowered him. Sometimes like cures like. If in a certain sense it is true of divine revelations, that “shallow draughts intoxicate the brain,” it is assuredly true that “drinking largely sobers us again.” If a glimpse of Christ makes holy men to faint, a clearer sight of Him will set them on their feet again. Our Lord went on to instruct John in the glory of His person and power, that his fears might be removed. And truly, brethren, John was in a right state for such celestial instruction; he who is lowly is ready to learn mysteries. He was like wax ready for the seal; or as paper cleansed of all other writing. Because we think we know, we know not; but the death of the pride of knowledge is the birth of true understanding. The Lord loves best for pupils those who lie lowest before Him. “The meek will He guide in judgment, the meek will He teach His way.” “With the lowly is wisdom.” Where Jesus is the teacher, and instructs the heart in the things concerning Himself, the soul is made to inherit substance, and its treasures are filled. Blessed are the men who are taught by Him who is the wisdom of God, even though while they watch at the posts of His doors they lie as dead men; they are blessed, for they shall find life, and obtain favor of the Lord. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm

God’s Thoughts and Ways Far Above Ours

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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.

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The Power of THE WORD

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

Fear not… – Revelation 1:17

The word of God, as we find it in this book, is very consoling; the word of God, as we hear it from Christ’s ministers, has great power in it; but the real and true power of the word lies in Jesus THE WORD. When the truth falls fresh from His own lips, then is it power. Right truly did the Master say, “the words which I speak unto you, they are spirit, and they are life.” With what power did those syllables fall on the fluttered heart of John-“Fear not.” Oh, that we might hear the same voice by the Spirit in our inmost souls.

“Oh, might I hear Thine heavenly tongue,
But whisper ‘Thou art Mine.’
Those gentle words should raise my song
To notes almost divine.”

Truly there are many voices and each has its significance, but the voice of Jesus has a heaven of bliss in its every accent. Let but my Beloved speak to me, and I will forego the angelic symphonies. Though He should only say, “Fear not,” and not a word beyond, it were worth worlds to see Him open His mouth unto us. But you say, can we still hear Jesus speak to us? Ay, by His Spirit. His Spirit still hath fellowship with the hearts of men, and He can bring the word of Scripture right home into the soul, until it becometh no more the letter but the living, quickening word of Christ. Do you know what I mean by this? If you do not, it is not possible to tell you; and if you do, you will need no explanation. Jesus speaks to the heart, the truth comes not in word only, but in demonstration of the Spirit and with power. O thou troubled believer, thou who art abashed by the very glory thou hast been made to see, be assured that Jesus will draw near unto thy soul, and touch thee, and speak with thee, so that thou shalt be strengthened with might by His Spirit in thine inner man. Had John not fallen as dead, he might never have heard the voice and felt the touch of His Lord. Sweet is the fall which leads to such a rise again. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm

His Hand of Favor and Power

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

And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; – Revelation 1:17

“He laid His right hand upon me.” It is the hand of favor, it is also the hand of power. God gives strength to those who have none. He puts power into the faint. When the child of God is brought very low, it is not a mere subject for consideration or theme for reflection that can lift him up: sick men want more than instruction, they require cordials and supports. There must be actual strength and energy imparted to a swooning soul, and, glory be to God, by His own Holy Spirit, Jesus can and does communicate energy to His people in the time of weakness. He is come that we may have life, and that we may have it more abundantly. The omnipotence of God is made to rest upon us, so that we even glory in infirmities. “My grace is sufficient for thee, my strength is made perfect in weakness,” is a blessed promise, which has been fulfilled to the letter to many of us. Our own strength has departed, and then the power of God has flowed in to fill up the vacuum. I cannot explain the process: these are secrets and mysteries to be experienced rather than expounded; but as the coming of the Spirit of God into us first of all makes us live in regeneration, so the renewed coming of the power of God into our soul raises us up from our weakness and our faintness into fresh energy. Be thou encouraged, then, thou fainting spirit today. They that trust upon the Lord shall renew their strength. All power belongeth unto the Lord, and He will give it plenteously to those who have none of their own. Be of good courage and wait upon Him for none shall be ashamed who make Him their confidence. Then there followed a word from the Master’s own mouth. He spoke and said, “Fear not.” Here He applied the remedy to the disease. Christ Himself is our medicine, as well as our physician. His voice which stilled the sea, also casts out all our fears. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm

Knowing the Love of Jesus

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

And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not… – Revelation 1:17

“He laid His hand upon me.” It is noticeable, that in the great cures which our Savior wrought, He almost always touched the patient. He could with a word have healed, but to prove His fellowship with the sick, He put His hand upon the leper, and upon the blind eye, and touched the deaf ear; thus, manifesting His condescending contact with the infirmities of our nature. The Master could have spoken a word to John and have revived him; but He did not stand at a distance, or guard Himself with a “Touch Me not” but, instead of that, He commenced His care with a touch. No other hand could have revived the apostle, but the hand which was pierced for him had matchless power. There is mighty healing in the royal hand of our Immanuel. When the Holy Spirit inspires us with a sense of the relationship which Christ bears to us, of the sympathy which Christ feels with us, of the kinship and fellow-feeling which reign in Jesus’ breast, then are we comforted. To know that He is not ashamed to call us brethren is a wellspring of comfort to a tried child of God; to feel His presence, to perceive the touch of His hand, and to hear Him say: “I am with thee, be not dismayed, for I am thy God,” this is new life to our waning spirits. Oh! what bliss is this. “In all their afflictions He was afflicted.” He is a brother born for adversity; a sympathetic and tender friend touched with a feeling of our infirmities. “He laid His hand upon me.” “O child of God, pray for a manifestation of the kinsman Christ to thy soul; ask that He would instruct thee as to the fact that He enters into thy grief, having Himself endured the like. Thou art one with Him, and He is one with thee; and as surely as the head feels the pain of the members, so does Jesus share in all the sorrows of His people. Let this be a comfort to thee, thou who art now lying as dead before the risen Lord. He comes near to thee, not to kill thee, but to revive thee by most intimate intercourse, talking with thee as a man speaketh with his friend. O man, greatly beloved, be not so overwhelmed with the greatness of thy Lord as to forget His love, His great love, His familiar love, which at this moment lays its hand upon thee. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm

The Best Remedy for Fears

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

And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last:  I am He that liveth, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen. – Revelation 1:17, 18

The knowledge of Jesus is the best remedy for fears: when we are better acquainted with our Lord, we part company with half our doubts-these bats and owls cannot bear the sun. Jesus in His person, work, offices, and relations, is a mine of consolation; every truth which is connected with Him is an argument against fear: when our heart shall be filled with perfect love to Him fear will be cast out, as Satan was cast down from heaven. Study then your Lord. Make it your life’s object to know Him. Seek the Holy Spirit’s illumination, and the choice privilege of fellowship, and your despondency and distress will vanish as night birds fly to hide themselves when the day breaketh. It is folly to walk in sorrow when we might constantly rejoice. We do not read that John was any more afraid after the Lord had discoursed lovingly upon His own glorious person and character. That divine enlightenment which was given to his mind, purged from it any secret mistake and misjudgment which had created excessive fear.

It is an infinite blessing to us to be utterly emptied, stripped, spoiled, and slain before the Lord. Our strength is our weakness, our life is our death, and when both are entirely gone, we begin to be strong and in very deed to live. To lie at Jesus’ feet is a right experience; to lie there as sick and wounded is better, but to lie there as dead is best of all; a man is taught in the mysteries of the kingdom, who comes to that. Moses with dim legal light needs to be told to put off his shoe from off his foot in the presence of the Lord of Hosts, but John is manifestly far in advance of him, because he lies lower, and is like a dead man before the Infinite Majesty. How blessed a death is death in Christ! How divine a thing is life in Him.  ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm

“I saw Him.”

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

And when I saw Him, I fell at His feet as dead. And He laid His right hand upon me, saying unto me, Fear not; I am the first and the last: I am He that liveth, and was dead; and behold, I am alive for evermore, Amen – Revelation 1:17,18 

I beg you to notice with care this beloved disciple in his fainting fit, and note first, the occasion of it. He says, “I saw Him.” This it was that made him faint with fear. “I saw HIM.” He had seen (Jesus) on earth, but not in His full glory as the first begotten from the dead, and the prince of the kings of the earth. When our Savior dwelt among men, in order to their redemption, He made Himself of no reputation and took upon Himself the form of a servant; for this reason, He restrained the flashings of His Deity, and the godhead shone through the manhood with occasional and softened rays. But now, Jesus was resplendent as the ancient of days, girt with a golden girdle, with a countenance outshining the sun in its strength, and this even the best beloved apostle could not endure. He could gaze with dauntless eye upon the throne of jasper and the rainbow of emerald, he could view with rapture the sea of glass like unto crystal, and the seven lamps of fire burning before the throne, but the vision of the Lord Himself was too much for him. He who quailed not when the doors of both heaven and hell were opened to him in vision yet fell lifeless when he saw the Lord. None either in earth or heaven can compare with Jesus in glory. Oh, for the day when we shall gaze upon His glory and partake in it. Such is His sacred will concerning us. “Father, I will that they also whom Thou hast given Me may be with Me where I am, that they may behold My glory.” To bear that sight we shall need to be purified and strengthened. God Himself must enlarge and strengthen our faculties, for as yet, like the disciples upon Tabor, we should be bewildered by the brightness…How shall an insect live in the furnace of the sun? How can mortal eye behold unquenched the light of Deity, or mortal ear hear that voice which is as many waters? …The most spiritual and sanctified minds, when they fully perceive the majesty and holiness of God, are so greatly conscious of the great disproportion between themselves and the Lord, that they are humbled and filled with holy awe, and even with dread and alarm.  ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1028.cfm