Fullness of Joy! Do You Not Know It?

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, salvation, The Holy Spirit 1 Comment

“These things have I spoken unto you, that my joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.” -John 15:11

A saint who lives near to God is so truly blessed that he will not be much astonished when he enters heaven. He will be surprised to behold its glories more clearly but he will have the same reason for delight as he possesses to-day. We live below the same life which we shall live above, for we are quickened by the same Spirit, are looking to the same Lord, and rejoicing in the same security. Joy! Do you not know it? Your Lord says, “That My joy might remain in you, and that your joy might be full.” You will be larger vessels in heaven, but you will not be fuller; you will be brighter, doubtless, but you will not be cleaner than you are when the Lord has washed you and made you white in His own blood. Do not be impatient to go to heaven. Nay, do not have a wish about it. Set very loose by the things of earth; yet count it a great privilege to have a long life in which to serve the Lord on earth. Our mortal life is but a brief interval between the two eternities, and if we judged unselfishly, and saw the needs of earth, we might almost say, “Give us back the antediluvian periods of human life, that through a chiliad we might serve the Lord in suffering and in reproach, as we cannot do in glory.” This life is the vestibule of glory. Array yourselves in the righteousness of Jesus Christ, for this is the court-dress of earth and heaven. Manifest at once the spirit of saints, or else you will never abide with them. Now begin the song which your lips shall carol in Paradise, or else you will never be admitted to the heavenly choirs; none can unite in the music but those who have rehearsed it here below.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1778.cfm

The Place of Fellowship

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, promises, The Father, The Holy Spirit 1 Comment

…and truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with His Son Jesus Christ. -1 John 1:3

Heaven is the place of fellowship with God, and this is a blessed feature in its joy; but in this we are now participators, for “Truly our fellowship is with the Father, and with his Son Jesus Christ.” The fellowship of the Holy Ghost is with us all; it is our joy and our delight. Having communion with the triune God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we are uplifted and sanctified, and it is becoming that by us the will of the Lord should be done on earth as it is in heaven.

“Up there,” says a brother, “they are all accepted, but here we are in a state of probation.” Did you read that in the Bible? for I never did. A believer is in no state of probation; he has passed from death unto life, and shall never come into condemnation. We are already “accepted in the Beloved,” and that acceptance is so given as never to be reversed. The Redeemer brought us up out of the horrible pit of probation, and He has set our feet on the rock of salvation, and there He has established our goings. “The righteous shall hold on His way, and he that hath clean hands shall wax stronger and stronger.” Wherefore should we not, as the accepted of the Lord, do His will on earth as it is in heaven? ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1778.cfm

The Immutability of God

Sherry sermon 2 Comments

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

Doing His Will

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises 1 Comment

“Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.” -Matthew 6:10

Mark the words “be done,” for they touch a vital point of the text. God’s will is done in heaven. How very practical! On earth His will is often forgotten, and His rule ignored. In the church of the present age there is a desire to be doing something for God, but few enquire what He wills them to do. Many things are done for the evangelizing of the people which were never commanded by the great Head of the Church, and cannot be approved of by Him. Can we expect that He will accept or bless that which He has never commanded? Will-worship is as sin in His sight. We are to do His will in the first place, and then to expect a blessing upon the doing of that will. My brethren, I am afraid that Christ’s will on earth is very much more discussed than done. I have heard of brethren spending days in disputing upon a precept which their dispute was breaking. In heaven they have no disputes, but they do the will of God without discord. We are best employed when we are actually doing something for this fallen world, and for the glory of our Lord. “Thy will be done”: we must come to actual works of faith and labours of love. Too often we are satisfied with having approved of that will, or with having spoken of it in words of commendation. But we must not stay in thought, resolve, or word; the prayer is practical and business-like, “Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.” An idle man stretched himself on his bed when the sun had risen high in heaven, and as he rolled over, he muttered to himself that he wished this were hard work, for he could do any quantity of it with pleasure. Many might wish that to think and to speak were to do the will of God; for them they would have effected it very thoroughly. Up yonder there is no playing with sacred things: they do His commandments, hearkening unto the voice of His word. Would God His will were not alone preached and sung below, but actually done as it is in heaven.~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1778.cfm

The Nearness of Heaven

Sherry Attributes of God, Character of Jesus, Christian Life, prayer, promises, prophecy, The Father, The Holy Spirit 1 Comment

After this manner therefore pray ye: Our Father which art in heaven…-Matthew 6:9

What is heaven? It is Paradise, or a garden. Walk amid your fragrant flowers and think of heaven’s bed of spices. Heaven is a kingdom: thrones, and crowns, and palms are the earthly emblems of the heavenlies. Heaven is a city; and there, again, you fetch your metaphor from the dwelling-places of men. It is a place of “many mansions”-the homes of the glorified. Houses are of earth, yet is God our dwelling-place. Heaven is a wedding-feast; and even such is this present dispensation. The tables are spread here as well as there; and it is our privilege to go forth and bring in the hedge-birds and the highwaymen, that the banqueting-hall may be filled.

Between earth and heaven there is but a thin partition. The home country is much nearer than we think. I question if “the land that is very far off” be a true name for heaven. Was it not an extended kingdom on earth which was intended by the prophet rather than the celestial home? Heaven is by no means the far country, for it is the Father’s house. Are we not taught to say, “Our Father which art in heaven”? Where the Father is the true Spirit of adoption counts Himself near. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1778.cfm

All of Creation Shall Be Redeemed

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

And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away -Revelation 21:1

He which testifieth these things saith, Surely I come quickly. Amen. Even so, come, Lord Jesus. -Revelation 22:20

I shall not venture far into prophecy. Some brethren are quite at home where I should lose myself. I have scarcely yet been able to get out of the gospels and the epistles; and that deep book of Revelation, with its waters to swim in, I must leave to better instructed minds. “Blessed is he that keepeth the sayings of the prophecy of that book;” to that blessing I would aspire, but I cannot yet make claim to interpret it. This much, however, seems plain,-there is to be “a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwelleth righteousness.” This creation, which now “groaneth and travaileth in pain,” in sympathy with man, is to be brought forth from its bondage into the glorious liberty of the children of God. Blessed be the Lord Jesus, when He brought His people out of their bondage, He did not redeem their spirits only, but their bodies also: hence their material part is the Lord’s as well as their spiritual nature, and hence again this very earth which we inhabit shall be uplifted in connection with us. The creation itself shall be delivered. Materialism, out of which there has been once made a vesture for the Godhead in the person of Christ, shall become a fit temple for the Lord of hosts. The New Jerusalem shall come down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride is prepared for her husband. We are sure of this. Therefore unto this consummation let us strive mightily, praying evermore, “Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.”~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1778.cfm

Thy Kingdom Restored

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

Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. -Matthew 6:10

“Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.” It was so once. Perfect obedience to the heavenly upon this earth will only be a return to the good old times which ended at the gate of Eden. There was a day when no gulf was digged between earth and heaven; there was scarce a boundary line, for the God of heaven walked in Paradise with Adam. All things on earth were then pure, and true, and happy. It was the garden of the Lord. Alas, that the trail of the serpent has now defiled everything. Then earth’s morning song was heard in heaven, and heaven’s hallelujahs floated down to earth at eventide. Those who desire to set up the kingdom of God are not instituting a new order of things; they are restoring, not inventing. Earth will drop into the old groove again. The Lord is king: and He has never left the throne. As it was in the beginning so shall it be yet again. History shall, in the divinest sense, repeat itself. The temple of the Lord shall be among men, and the Lord God shall dwell among them. “Truth shall spring out of the earth; and righteousness shall look down from heaven.”

“Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven.” It will be so at the last. ~ C.H. Spurgeon

https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/1778.cfm