Tozer: on being

Saturday, May 12, 2018
    Commemoration of Aiden Wilson Tozer, Spiritual Writer, 1963
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshipers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshipers must worship in spirit and in truth.”
    —John 4:23-24 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The Lord of all being is far more than the Lord of all beings. He is the Lord of all actual existence. He is the Lord of all kinds of beings—spiritual being, natural being, physical being. Therefore, when we rightly worship Him we encompass all being.
    ... A. W. Tozer (1897-1963), Whatever Happened to Worship?, Christian Publications, 1985, p. 106 (see the book)
    See also John 4:23-24; Ex. 3:14; Ps. 51:17; John 8:58
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You are the foundation of all. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Spurgeon: carrying one's cross

Friday, May 11, 2018
Meditation:
    Then [Jesus] said to them all: “If anyone would come after me, he must deny himself and take up his cross daily and follow me. For whoever wants to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for me will save it.”
    —Luke 9:23-24 (NIV)
Quotation:
    There are no crown wearers in heaven who were not cross-bearers here below.
    ... Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892), Gleanings Among the Sheaves, New York: Sheldon, 1869, p. 57 (see the book)
    See also Luke 9:23-24; Matt. 10:38; 16:24-25; 1 Cor. 9:25; 2 Tim. 4:8; Rev. 4:9-11
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, teach me not to spurn the cross You send me. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Underhill: Immanence

Thursday, May 10, 2018
    Ascension
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don’t be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows.”
    —Matthew 10:29-31 (NIV)
Quotation:
I come in the little things,
Saith the Lord:
Not borne on morning wings
Of majesty, but I have set My Feet
Amidst the delicate and bladed wheat
That springs triumphant in the furrowed sod.
There do I dwell, in weakness and in power;
Not broken or divided, saith our God!
In your strait garden plot I come to flower:
About your porch My Vine
Meek, fruitful, doth entwine;
Waits, at the threshold, Love’s appointed hour.

I come in the little things,
Saith the Lord:
Yea! on the glancing wings
Of eager birds, the softly pattering feet
Of furred and gentle beasts, I come to meet
Your hard and wayward heart. In brown bright eyes
That peep from out the brake, I stand confest.
On every nest
Where feathery patience is content to brood
And leaves her pleasure for the high emprise
Of motherhood—
There doth My Godhead rest.

I come in the little things,
Saith the Lord:
My starry wings
I do forsake,
Love’s highway of humility to take:
Meekly I fit My Stature to your need.
In beggar’s part
About your gates I shall not cease to plead—
As man, to speak with man—
Till by such art
I shall achieve My Immemorial Plan,
Pass the low lintel of the human heart.
    ... Evelyn Underhill (1875-1941), included in The Questing Spirit, Halford E. Luccock & Frances Brentano, New York: Coward-McCann, 1947, p. 294 (see the book)
    See also Matt. 10:29-31; 1 Kings 19:11-12; Ezek. 36:26; John 15:5; 2 Cor. 12:9
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, though I am small, come into my heart.

CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Niebuhr: beyond optimism

Wednesday, May 9, 2018
Meditation:
    For [the Father] has rescued us from the dominion of darkness and brought us into the kingdom of the Son he loves, in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins. He is the image of the invisible God, the firstborn over all creation.
    —Colossians 1:13-15 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Ultimate confidence in the goodness of life cannot rest upon confidence in the goodness of man. If that is where it rests, it is an optimism which will suffer ultimate disillusionment. Romanticism will be transmuted into cynicism, as it has always been in the world’s history. The faith of a Christian is something quite different from this optimism. It is trust in God, in a good God who created a good world, though the world is not now good; in a good God, powerful and good enough finally to destroy the evil that men do and redeem them of their sins. This kind of faith is not optimism. It does not, in fact, arise until optimism breaks down and men cease to trust in themselves that they are righteous.
    ... Reinhold Niebuhr (1892-1971), Beyond Tragedy, New York: C. Scribner’s Sons, 1937, p. 131 (see the book)
    See also Pr. 3:5; Gen. 1:31; 3:17; Ps. 118:9; Luke 18:9-14; John 15:18-19; Rom. 10:3; Col. 1:13-15
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You provide our only hope. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Juliana of Norwich: the deepest pit

Tuesday, May 8, 2018
    Feast of Juliana of Norwich, Mystic, Teacher, c.1417
    Commemoration of Dallas Willard, Teacher, Spiritual Writer, 2013
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] “If your hand or your foot causes you to sin cut it off and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life maimed or crippled than to have two hands or two feet and be thrown into eternal fire. And if your eye causes you to sin, gouge it out and throw it away. It is better for you to enter life with one eye than to have two eyes and be thrown into the fire of hell.”
    —Matthew 18:8-9 (NIV)
Quotation:
    If afore us were laid together all the pains in Hell... and in Earth—death and the rest—and by itself, sin, we would rather choose all that pain than sin. For sin is so vile and so greatly to be hated that it may be likened to no pain that is not sin. To me was shown no harder hell than sin.
    ... Juliana of Norwich (1342?-1417), Revelations of Divine Love, Grace Harriet Warrack, ed., Methuen, 1901, ch. XL (see the book)
    See also Matt. 18:8-9; 5:29-30; Mark 9:43-48; Rom. 4:8; 6:2
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, teach me to hate my sin as You do. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Poteat: The Jericho Road

Monday, May 7, 2018
Meditation:
    “What is written in the Law?” [Jesus] replied. “How do you read it?”
    He answered: “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’; and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’”
    “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”
    But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”
    In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he fell into the hands of robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead...”
    —Luke 10:26-30 (NIV)
Quotation:
I know the road to Jericho,
    It’s in a part of town
That’s full of factories and filth.
    I’ve seen the folks go down.

Small folk with roses in their cheeks
    And starlight in their eyes;
And seen them fall among the thieves,
    And heard their helpless cries.

The priests and Levites speeding by
    Read of the latest crimes
In headlines spread in black and red
    Across The Evening Times.

How hard for those in limousines
    To heal the heart of man!
It was a slow-paced ass that bore
    The Good Samaritan.
    ... Edwin McNeill Poteat (1892-1955), in The Questing Spirit, Halford E. Luccock & Frances Brentano, New York: Coward-McCann, 1947, p. 427-428 (see the book)
    See also Luke 10:26-37; 16:15; 18:9-14
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, grant me the Samaritan’s heart.

CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth

Owen: the opposition of hell

Sunday, May 6, 2018
Meditation:
    What, then, shall we say in response to this? If God is for us, who can be against us?
    —Romans 8:31 (NIV)
Quotation:
    As they that know any thing in this world know that, as the first great opposition of hell, the world, and corrupt nature, is against faith to God by Christ; so the next great opposition made against us, is against our love.
    ... John Owen (1616-1683), Works of John Owen, v. IX, New York: R. Carter, 1851, Sermon XXI, p. 261 (see the book)
    See also Rom. 8:31; Matt. 24:22; John 13:34; 15:12; Rom. 12:10; 1 Pet. 1:22; Rev. 2;4
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I am the weak point in Your plan. Strengthen me against sin, for Your Kingdom’s sake. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    Jonah    Ruth