Phillips: our honour in sharing

Saturday, April 25, 2020
    Feast of Mark the Evangelist
Meditation:
    You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised.
    —Hebrews 10:36 (NIV)
Quotation:
    It is essential to our life as Christians, that we should recognize cheerfully and realistically that no worth-while work is accomplished without patience and sacrifice; and more important still, that we should realize with a sudden quickening of the pulses that the cost we bear is, not a kind of occupational nuisance, but the honour of sharing God’s cost in bringing men to Himself and changing them from being wayward human beings into sons of Himself.
    ... J. B. Phillips (1906-1982), Making Men Whole, London: Highway Press, 1952, p. 45 (see the book)
    See also Heb. 10:36; 1 Cor. 12:4; 2 Cor. 1:5-7; Col. 1:24; Heb. 12:1
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You bore the cost that I could not pay. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Lewis: the cosmology myth

Friday, April 24, 2020
    Commemoration of Mellitus, First Bishop of London, 624
Meditation:
There is a way that seems right to a man,
    but in the end it leads to death.
    —Proverbs 14:12 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Long before I believed Theology to be true, I had already decided that the popular scientific picture at any rate was false. One absolutely central inconsistency ruins it... The whole picture professes to depend on inferences from observed facts. Unless inference is valid, the whole picture disappears. Unless we can be sure that reality in the remotest nebula or the remotest part obeys the thought-laws of the human scientist here and now in his laboratory—in other words, unless Reason is an absolute—all is in ruins. Yet those who ask me to believe this world-picture also ask me to believe that Reason is simply the unforeseen and unintended by-product of mindless matter at one stage of its endless and aimless becoming. Here is flat contradiction. They ask me at the same moment to accept a conclusion and to discredit the only testimony on which that conclusion can be based. The difficulty is to me a fatal one; and the fact that when you put it to many scientists, far from having an answer, they seem not even to understand what the difficulty is, assures me that I have not found a mare’s nest but detected a radical disease in their whole mode of thought from the very beginning. The man who has once understood the situation is compelled henceforth to regard the scientific cosmology as being, in principle, a myth—though no doubt a great many true particulars have been worked into it.
    ... C. S. Lewis (1898-1963), “Is Theology Poetry?”, in They Asked for a Paper, London: Geoffrey Bles, 1962, p. 162 (see the book)
    See also Prov. 3:5; 14:12; Matt. 7:13-14; Luke 13:24; Acts 17:2-3; 1 Cor. 1:18; Gal. 6:3
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You cause all things to hang together. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Owen: first obedience, then peace

Thursday, April 23, 2020
    Feast of George, Martyr, Patron of England, c.304
    Commemoration of Michael Ramsey, Archbishop of Canterbury, Teacher, 1988
Meditation:
If you, O LORD, kept a record of sins,
    O Lord, who could stand?
But with you there is forgiveness;
    therefore you are feared.
    —Psalm 130:3-4 (NIV)
Quotation:
    See in the meantime that your faith bringeth forth obedience, and God in due time will cause it to bring forth peace.
    ... John Owen (1616-1683), An Exposition upon Psalm CXXX [1668], in Works of John Owen, v. VI, New York: R. Carter & Bros., 1851, p. 563 (see the book)
    See also Ps. 130:3-4; 25:11; 86:5; 103:2-5; Isa. 1:18; Jer. 31:34; John 14:27; Rom. 5:1-2; 2 Cor. 1:12; 10:5
Quiet time reflection:
    Keep my footsteps in the right path, Lord, that I may receive Your peace. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Betz: Jesus, historical and known by faith

Wednesday, April 22, 2020
Meditation:
    [Peter:] “Therefore let all Israel be assured of this: God has made this Jesus, whom you crucified, both Lord and Christ.”
    —Acts 2:36 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Without the historical Jesus, the Christ of the church is hollow, a radiant shell, a mythical hero without historical weight. On the other hand, anyone who clings to the historical Jesus alone is blind, for without the light of the Easter creed, he is swallowed up by the darkness of the cross.
    ... Otto Betz (1917-2005), What Do We Know About Jesus?, translation of Was wissen wir von Jesus?, 1965, London, S.C.M. Press, 1968, p. 113 (see the book)
    See also Acts 2:36; Ps. 2:7-8; Acts 4:11-12; 5:30-31; 1 Cor. 1:22-23; 2:4; 2 Cor. 2:17; 4:2; Eph. 4:14; 5:6; 1 Tim. 1:3-4; 4:7; 2 Pet. 1:16:3:3-4
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your victory is mine as well. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Anselm: ask and receive

Tuesday, April 21, 2020
    Feast of Anselm, Abbot of Le Bec, Archbishop of Canterbury, Teacher, 1109
Meditation:
    [Jesus:] And in that day ye shall ask me nothing. Verily, verily, I say unto you, Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, he will give it you. Hitherto have ye asked nothing in my name: ask, and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full.
    —John 16:23-24 (NIV)
Quotation:
    My God and my Lord, my hope and the joy of my heart, speak unto my soul and tell me whether this is the joy of which thou tellest us through thy Son: Ask and ye shall receive, that your joy may be full (John 16:24). For I have found a joy that is full, and more than full. For when heart, and mind, and soul, and all the man, are full of that joy, joy beyond measure will still remain. Hence, not all of that joy shall enter into those who rejoice; but they who rejoice shall wholly enter into that joy.
    ... St. Anselm (1033-1109), Discourse on the Existence of God, Chicago: The Opencourt Publishing Co, 1903, p. 33 (see the book)
    See also John 16:23-24; Hab. 3:18; 1 Thess. 1:4-6; 5:16; 1 Pet. 4:13; 1 John 1:4
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I receive Your grace in joy. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Law: the finality of choice

Monday, April 20, 2020
Meditation:
    The Lord is not slow in keeping his promise, as some understand slowness. He is patient with you, not wanting anyone to perish, but everyone to come to repentance.
    —2 Peter 3:9 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Hear how the God of nature himself speaks of this matter: “Behold, I have set before thee life and death, fire and water,—choose whither thou wilt.” Here lies the whole of the divine mercy; ’tis all on this side the Day of Judgment: till the end of time, God is compassionate and long-suffering, and continues to every creature a power of choosing life or death, water or fire; but when the end of time is come, there is an end of choice, and the last judgment is only a putting everyone into the full and sole possession of that which he has chosen.
    ... William Law (1686-1761), An Appeal to All that Doubt [1740], in Works of Rev. William Law, v. VI, London: G. Moreton, 1893, p. 98 (see the book)
    See also 2 Pet. 3:9; Deut. 30:15-17; Gal. 6:7; Jas. 5:11
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, incline me to repentance. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Carmichael: choosing the best for us

Sunday, April 19, 2020
    Commemoration of Alphege, Archbishop of Canterbury, Martyr, 1012
Meditation:
    And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God’s possession—to the praise of his glory.
    —Ephesians 1:13-14 (NIV)
Quotation:
    “I am learning never to be disappointed, but to praise,” Arnot of Central Africa wrote in his journal long ago... I think it must hurt the tender love of our Father when we press for reasons for His dealings with us, as though He were not Love, as though not He but another chose our inheritance for us, and as though what He chose to allow could be less than the very best and dearest that Love Eternal had to give.
    ... Amy Carmichael (1867-1951), Rose from Brier [1933], London: SPCK, 1950, p. 116 (see the book)
    See also Eph. 1:11-14; Matt. 6:31-34; Rom. 8:28; Phil. 4:11; Tit. 3:4-7; 1 Tim. 6:6-9; Heb. 13:5-6
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, grant me the mind of Christ, Who does not doubt or waver. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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