Wilberforce: ignoring the eternal things

Thursday, July 30, 2015
    Commemoration of William Wilberforce, Social Reformer, 1833
Meditation:
    The world and its desires pass away, but the man who does the will of God lives forever.
    —1 John 2:17 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The generality of nominal Christians... are almost entirely taken up with the concerns of the present world. They know indeed that they are mortal but they do not feel it. The truth rests in their understandings, and cannot gain admission into their hearts. This speculative persuasion is altogether different from that strong practical impression of the infinite importance of eternal things, which, attended with a proportionate sense of the shortness and uncertainty of all below, while it prompts to activity from a conviction that “the night cometh when no man can work,” produces a certain firmness of texture, which hardens us against the buffetings of fortune, and prevents our being very deeply penetrated by the cares and interests, the good or evil of this transitory state.
    ... William Wilberforce (1759-1833), A Practical View, Boston: Crocker & Brewster, 1829, p. 170 (see the book)
    See also 1 John 2:17; Matt. 6:31-34; John 9:4; 15:19; Gal. 1:10; 2 Tim. 2:3-4; Jas. 4:4; 1 John 2:15-16
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You remind me that my home is not here. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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