Owen: whither our thoughts

Saturday, November 5, 2011
Meditation:
    And he told them this parable: “The ground of a certain rich man produced a good crop. He thought to himself, ‘What shall I do? I have no place to store my crops.’
    “Then he said, ‘This is what I’ll do. I will tear down my barns and build bigger ones, and there I will store all my grain and my goods. And I’ll say to myself, “You have plenty of good things laid up for many years. Take life easy; eat, drink and be merry.”’
    “But God said to him, ‘You fool! This very night your life will be demanded from you. Then who will get what you have prepared for yourself?’
    “This is how it will be with anyone who stores up things for himself but is not rich toward God.”
    —Luke 12:16-21 (NIV)
Quotation:
    We all profess that we are bound for heaven, immortality, and glory; but is it any evidence we really design it, if all our thoughts are consumed about the trifles of this world, which we must leave behind us, and if we have only occasional thoughts of things above?
    ... John Owen (1616-1683), I.4 in The Grace and Duty of being Spiritually Minded [1681], in Works of John Owen, v. VII, London: Johnson & Hunter, 1852, p. 303 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, keep my eye on You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Bunyan: the true source of authenticity

Friday, November 4, 2011
Meditation:
    When they heard about the resurrection of the dead, some of them sneered, but others said, “We want to hear you again on this subject.”
    At that, Paul left the Council. A few men became followers of Paul and believed. Among them was Dionysius, a member of the Areopagus, also a woman named Damaris, and a number of others.
    —Acts 17:32-33 (NIV)
Quotation:
    [Mr. Gifford] made it much his business to deliver the people of God from all those false and unsound rests that, by nature, we are prone to take and make to our souls. He pressed us to take special heed that we took not up any truth upon trust—as from this, or that, or any other man or men—but to cry mightily to God that He would convince us of the reality thereof, and set us down therein, by his own Spirit in the holy Word.
    ... John Bunyan (1628-1688), Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners [1666] The Whole Works of John Bunyan, v. I, London: Blackie, 1862, p. 20 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You show Your people all truth. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Hooker: in Christ

Thursday, November 3, 2011
    Feast of Richard Hooker, Priest, Anglican Apologist, Teacher, 1600
    Commemoration of Martin of Porres, Dominican Friar, 1639
Meditation:
    ... I consider [all things] rubbish, that I may gain Christ and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own that comes from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ—the righteousness that comes from God and is by faith.
    —Philippians 3:8-9 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The righteousness wherein we must be found, if we will be justified, is not our own; therefore we cannot be justified by any inherent quality. Christ hath merited righteousness for as many as are found in him. In him God findeth us, if we be faithful; for by faith we are incorporated into Christ.
    ... Richard Hooker (1554?-1600), The Work of Mr. Richard Hooker, v.III, London: W. Clarke, 1821, p. 341 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, may I be found in You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Rutherford: repentance

Wednesday, November 2, 2011
    Feast of All Souls
Meditation:
    “In your anger do not sin”: Do not let the sun go down while you are still angry, and do not give the devil a foothold.
    —Ephesians 4:26-27 (NIV)
Quotation:
    A repenting man is more angry at his own heart that consented to sin than he is at the devil who did tempt him to sin.
    ... Samuel Rutherford (1600-1664), Quaint Sermons of Samuel Rutherford: hitherto unpublished, London: Hodder & Stoughton, 1885, p. 123 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I cannot defeat sin in my own power. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Muggeridge: meaning

Tuesday, November 1, 2011
    Feast of All Saints
Meditation:
    The night before Herod was to bring him to trial, Peter was sleeping between two soldiers, bound with two chains, and sentries stood guard at the entrance. Suddenly an angel of the Lord appeared and a light shone in the cell. He struck Peter on the side and woke him up. “Quick, get up!” he said, and the chains fell off Peter’s wrists.
    Then the angel said to him, “Put on your clothes and sandals.” And Peter did so. “Wrap your cloak around you and follow me,” the angel told him. Peter followed him out of the prison, but he had no idea that what the angel was doing was really happening; he thought he was seeing a vision. They passed the first and second guards and came to the iron gate leading to the city. It opened for them by itself, and they went through it. When they had walked the length of one street, suddenly the angel left him.
    Then Peter came to himself and said, “Now I know without a doubt that the Lord sent his angel and rescued me from Herod’s clutches and from everything the Jewish people were anticipating.”
    —Acts 12:6-11 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Where, then, does happiness lie? In forgetfulness, not indulgence, of the self. In escape from sensual appetites, not in their satisfaction. We live in a dark, self-enclosed prison, which is all we see or know if our glance is fixed ever downward. To lift it upward, becoming aware of the wide, luminous universe outside—this alone is happiness. At its highest level, such happiness is the ecstasy that mystics have inadequately described. At more humdrum levels, it is human love; the delights and beauties of our dear earth, its colors and shapes and sounds; the enchantment of understanding and laughing, and all other exercise of such faculties as we possess; the marvel of the meaning of everything, fitfully glimpsed, inadequately expounded, but ever present.
    ... Malcolm Muggeridge (1903-1990), Jesus Rediscovered, Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1969, p. 159 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You have granted us release from ourselves. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Carlyle: the Bible, by grace

Monday, October 31, 2011
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “Therefore everyone who hears these words of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house on the rock. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house; yet it did not fall, because it had its foundation on the rock. But everyone who hears these words of mine and does not put them into practice is like a foolish man who built his house on sand. The rain came down, the streams rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house, and it fell with a great crash.”
    —Matthew 7:24-27 (NIV)
Quotation:
    It must have been a most blessed discovery, that of an old Latin Bible which he found in the Erfurt Library about this time. He had never seen the Book before. It taught him another lesson than that of fasts and vigils... Luther learned now that a man was saved not by singing masses, but by the infinite grace of God: a more credible hypothesis. He gradually got himself founded, as on the rock. No wonder he should venerate the Bible, which had brought this blessed help to him. He prized it as the Word of the Highest must be prized by such a man. He determined to hold by that, as through life and to death he firmly did.
    ... Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881), On Heroes, Hero-worship and the Heroic in History, New York: Wiley, 1859, p. 116 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, ground me in your word. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Luther: faith is unshakable confidence

Sunday, October 30, 2011
    Commemoration of Martin Luther, Teacher, Reformer, 1546
Meditation:
    You, however, are controlled not by the sinful nature but by the Spirit, if the Spirit of God lives in you. And if anyone does not have the Spirit of Christ, he does not belong to Christ.
    —Romans 8:9 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Faith is a living, unshakeable confidence in God's grace; it is so certain, that someone would die a thousand times for it. This kind of trust in and knowledge of God's grace makes a person joyful, confident, and happy with regard to God and all creatures. This is what the Holy Spirit does by faith. Through faith, a person will do good to everyone without coercion, willingly and happily; he will serve everyone, suffer everything for the love and praise of God, who has shown him such grace. It is as impossible to separate works from faith as burning and shining from fire.
    ... Martin Luther (1483-1546), “Preface to the Letter of St. Paul to the Romans”, par. 15 (see the book)
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You have granted Your people the liberty of faith. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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