Spurgeon: the best soldiers

Saturday, March 30, 2019
Meditation:
He who goes out weeping,
    carrying seed to sow,
will return with songs of joy,
    carrying sheaves with him.
    —Psalm 126:6 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The Lord gets his best soldiers out of the highlands of affliction.
    ... Charles Haddon Spurgeon (1834-1892), Gleanings Among the Sheaves, New York: Sheldon, 1869, p. 7 (see the book)
    See also Ps. 126:5-6; 2 Tim. 2:11-13; Heb. 12:6-7; 1 Pet. 5:10
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You provide the grace of labor for Your people. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Howard: the fact of the Father

Friday, March 29, 2019
    Commemoration of Jack Winslow, Missionary, Evangelist, 1974
Meditation:
    And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands; Saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing.
    —Revelation 5:11-12 (KJV)
Quotation:
    The desire for certitude is natural enough and explains the human tendency to mistake faith for certainty. This is not a specially religious mistake. We think of supernaturalism when faith is mentioned, but the naturalistic description of the world also operates on assumptions that require a faith as robust as does the most soaring mysticism. The usual efforts to skirt faith beg all the questions there are. A psychiatrist, for instance, who points out to you that you believe in God the Father because you need a father, or that you became a missionary to expiate your guilt feelings, may be quite correct, but he has not touched on the prior question as to whether there is, in fact, a cosmic father figure who is the archetype of all other fathers, or whether there is an evangel worth spending your life promulgating.
    ... Thomas Howard (b. 1935), Christ the Tiger, Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1967, p. 97 (see the book)
    See also Rev. 5:11-12; Ps. 20:7; 94:20-22; Matt. 7:11; Rom. 8:15; 1 Cor. 15:9
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You are my true Father. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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St. Alcuin: O Lord our God

Thursday, March 28, 2019
Meditation:
    Jesus said to them, “Have you never read in the Scriptures:
    “‘The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone;
    the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our eyes’?”
    —Matthew 21:42 (NIV)
Quotation:
O Lord our God,
    Who has called us to serve You,
In the midst of the world’s affairs,
    When we stumble, hold us;
When we fall, lift us up;
    When we are hard pressed with evil, deliver us;
When we turn from what is good, turn us back;
    And bring us at last to Your glory.
    ... St. Alcuin (c. 735-804) (see the book)
    See also Matt. 21:42; Isa. 8:14; Mark 12:10; 1 Cor. 8:13
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You are delivering us from evil. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Denney: evidence of atonement

Wednesday, March 27, 2019
Meditation:
    Therefore, if anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has gone, the new has come!
    —2 Corinthians 5:17 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The demand that the Atonement shall be exhibited in vital relation to a new life in which sin is overcome... is entirely legitimate, and it touches a weak point in the traditional Protestant doctrine. Dr. [Thomas] Chalmers tells us that he was brought up—such was the effect of the current orthodoxy upon him—in a certain distrust of good works. Some were certainly wanted, but not as being themselves salvation, only, as he puts it, as tokens of justification. It was a distinct stage in his religious progress when he realised that true justification sanctifies, and that the soul can and ought to abandon itself spontaneously and joyfully to do the good that it delights in... An atonement that does not regenerate... is not an atonement in which men can be asked to believe.
    ... James Denney (1856-1917), The Atonement and the Modern Mind, London: Hodder and Stoughton, 1903, p. 40-41 (see the book)
    See also 2 Cor. 5:17; Ps. 51:10; Eze. 11:19; Matt. 12:33; Rom. 6:4-6; 8:9-10; Eph. 2:10; 4:22-24; Col. 3:1-3
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your atonement has created Your people. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Pinnock: necessity

Tuesday, March 26, 2019
    Feast of Harriet Monsell of Clewer, Religious, 1883
Meditation:
    Whither shall I go from thy spirit? or whither shall I flee from thy presence? If I ascend up into heaven, thou art there: if I make my bed in hell, behold, thou art there.
    —Psalm 139:7-8 (KJV)
Quotation:
    For the Scriptures then, the existence of God is both a historical truth (God acted into history), and an existential truth (God reveals himself to every soul). His existence is both objectively and subjectively evident. It is necessary logically because our assumption of order, design, and rationality rests upon it. It is necessary morally because there is no explanation for the shape of morality apart from it. It is necessary emotionally because the human experience requires an immediate and ultimate environment. It is necessary personally because the exhaustion of all material possibilities still cannot give satisfaction to the heart. The deepest proof for God’s existence, apart from history, is just life itself. God has created man in his image, and men cannot elude the implications of this fact. Everywhere their identity pursues them. Ultimately, there is no escape.
    ... Clark H. Pinnock (1937-2010), Set Forth Your Case, Chicago: Moody Press, 1971, p. 111 (see the book)
    See also Ps. 139:7-8; Gen. 1:26; Isa. 41:13; Isa. 65:1; Jer. 23:23-24; Obad. 1:4; Jon. 1:1-4; Heb. 4:12-13
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I have not pursued You, but You pursued me. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Tillotson: resolutions

Monday, March 25, 2019
    Feast of the Annunciation of our Lord to the Virgin Mary
Meditation:
    But you, keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, do the work of an evangelist, discharge all the duties of your ministry.
    —2 Timothy 4:5 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Resolution is no strange and extraordinary thing; it is one of the most common acts that belong to us as we are men; but we do not ordinarily apply it to the best purposes. It is not so ordinary for men to resolve to be good, as to be rich and great; not so common for men to resolve against sin, as to resolve against poverty and suffering. It is not so usual for men to resolve to keep a good conscience, as to keep a good place.
    ... John Tillotson (1630-1694), Works of Dr. John Tillotson, v. VII, London: J. F. Dove, for R. Priestley, 1820, Sermon CLXVII, p. 422 (see the book)
    See also 2 Tim. 4:5; Job 34:31-32; 2 Tim. 2:3; Heb. 12:3
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, help me keep to my promises. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Lightner: the breakdown of communication

Sunday, March 24, 2019
    Feast of Oscar Romero, Archbishop of San Salvador, Martyr, 1980
    Commemoration of Paul Couturier, Priest, Ecumenist, 1953
Meditation:
    Now we see but a poor reflection as in a mirror; then we shall see face to face. Now I know in part; then I shall know fully, even as I am fully known.
    —1 Corinthians 13:12 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Arguments for the existence of God are very restricted; some of them are more restricted and limited than others. They do not prove beyond all question the existence of the God of the Bible. Furthermore, it must be remembered that man’s mind, his thinking process, has been affected by his fall into sin. This means that there are definite limitations to God’s revelation in nature. The problem is not in the revelation but in the receiver of the revelation.
    ... Robert P. Lightner (1931-2018), The God of the Bible [1973], Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Book House, 1978, formerly published as The First Fundamental: God, p. 21 (see the book)
    See also 1 Cor. 13:12; Ps. 8:3-4; 19:1-4; John 10:14-15; Rom. 8:18; 2 Cor. 5:7; Jas. 1:23-24; 1 John 3:2
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, heal my blindness. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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