Fuller: God who sees all

Saturday, February 24, 2024
Meditation:
    Likewise the Spirit also helpeth our infirmities: for we know not what we should pray for as we ought: but the Spirit itself maketh intercession for us with groanings which cannot be uttered.
    —Romans 8:26 (KJV)
Quotation:
    Sorrow for sin and sorrow for suffering are ofttimes so twisted and interwoven in the same person—yea, in the same sigh and groan—that sometimes it is impossible for the party himself so to separate and divide them in his own sense and feeling, as to know which proceeds from the one and which from the other. Only the all-seeing eye of an infinite God is able to discern and distinguish them.
    ... Thomas Fuller (1608-1661), The Cause and Cure of a Wounded Conscience [1655], Dialogue I. (see the book)
    See also Rom. 8:26; Ps. 6:3; 42:1-4; 69:3; 77:1-3; 119:81; 143:4-7; Isa. 35:10; 53:11; 2 Cor. 5:1-4; 7:10-11
Quiet time reflection:
    Do I trust God to distinguish sorrow for sin from among my sorrows? CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Buechner: the bridge

Friday, February 23, 2024
    Feast of Polycarp, Bishop of Smyrna, Martyr, c.155
Meditation:
You know my folly, O God;
    my guilt is not hidden from you.
    —Psalm 69:5 (NIV)
Quotation:
    To confess your sins to God is not to tell him anything he doesn’t already know. Until you confess them, however, they are the abyss between you. When you confess them, they become the bridge.
    ... Frederick Buechner (1926-2022), Wishful Thinking: A Theological ABC, Harper & Row, 1973, revised, HarperCollins, 1993, p. 15 (see the book)
    See also Ps. 69:5; 2 Sam. 24:10; Ps. 32:5; 41:4; 51:2-5; Isa. 59:12-13; Jer. 14:7; Matt. 6:8; Luke 15:17-21; Jas. 5:16; 1 John 1:9
Quiet time reflection:
    Is there some sin I hide from confession? CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Cowper: O for a closer walk with God

Thursday, February 22, 2024
Meditation:
    Did not our heart burn within us, while he talked with us by the way, and while he opened to us the scriptures?
    —Luke 24:32 (KJV)
Quotation:
O for a closer walk with God,
    A calm and heavenly frame,
A light to shine upon the road
    That leads me to the Lamb!

Return, O holy Dove, return,
    Sweet messenger of rest:
I hate the sins that made Thee mourn,
    And drove Thee from my breast.

The dearest idol I have known,
    Whate’er that idol be,
Help me to tear it from Thy throne,
    And worship only Thee.

So shall my walk be close with God,
    Calm and serene my frame;
So purer light shall mark the road
    That leads me to the Lamb.
    ... William Cowper (1731-1800), included in The Works of William Cowper: his life, letters, and poems, New York: R. Carter & Brothers, 1851, p. 670 (see the book)
    See also Luke 24:32; Gen. 5:24; Deut. 28:9; John 1:29,32; 2 Cor. 5:7; Col. 2:6-7; Rev. 5:12
Quiet time reflection:
    Is my walk close to the Lord?

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Lewis: avoiding a delicate subject

Wednesday, February 21, 2024
Meditation:
    For this reason Christ is the mediator of a new covenant, that those who are called may receive the promised eternal inheritance—now that he has died as a ransom to set them free from the sins committed under the first covenant.
    —Hebrews 9:15 (NIV)
Quotation:
    We are very shy nowadays of even mentioning Heaven. We are afraid of the jeer about “pie in the sky,” and of being told that we are trying to “escape” from the duty of making a happy world here and now, into dreams of a happy world elsewhere. But either there is “pie in the sky” or there is not. If there is not, then Christianity is false, for this doctrine is woven into its whole fabric. If there is, then this truth, like any other, must be faced, whether it is useful at political meetings or no.
    ... C. S. Lewis (1898-1963), The Problem of Pain, New York: Macmillan, 1944, p. 132-133 (see the book)
    See also Heb. 9:15; Matt. 5:11-12; 6:1,9-10,20; Mark 10:21; 12:25; Luke 6:22-23; 11:2; 18:22; John 3:13; 14:2-3; Rom. 5:8; Eph. 1:7; Phil. 3:20; Col. 1:5-6; 1 Thess. 4:16-17; 1 Pet. 1:3-5
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You keep Your promises. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Shepherd: witness to facts

Tuesday, February 20, 2024
    Commemoration of Cecile Isherwood, Founder of the Community of the Resurrection, Grahamstown, South Africa, 1906
Meditation:
    And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile; you are still in your sins.
    —1 Corinthians 15:17 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The Gospel is not presented to mankind as an argument about religious principles. Nor is it offered as a philosophy of life. Christianity is a witness to certain facts—to events that have happened, to hopes that have been fulfilled, to realities that have been experienced, to a Person who has lived and died and been raised from the dead to reign for ever.
    ... Massey H. Shepherd, Jr. (1913-1990), Far and Near
    See also 1 Cor. 15:14-17; Luke 19:10; Rom. 4:25; 1 Cor. 1:19-24; Col. 2:8; 1 John 4:2-3; 2 John 1:7
Quiet time reflection:
    Do I think about philosophy and ideas instead of enjoying the presence of Jesus in my heart? CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Nouwen: dying to our own

Monday, February 19, 2024
Meditation:
    [Christ] himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, so that we might die to sins and live for righteousness; by his wounds you have been healed.
    —1 Peter 2:24 (NIV)
Quotation:
    [In prayer] we want to move closer to God, the source and goal of our existence, but at the same time we realize that the closer we come to God the stronger will be his demand to let go of the many ‘safe’ structures we have built around ourselves. Prayer is such a radical act because it requires us to criticize our whole way of being in the world, to lay down our old selves and accept our new self, which is Christ... Prayer therefore is the act of dying to all that we consider to be our own and of being born to a new existence which is not of this world.
    ... Henri J. M. Nouwen (1932-1996), originally in “Letting go of all things” in Sojourners8, May 1979, p. 5-6, The Only Necessary Thing, p. 39
    See also 1 Pet. 2:24; Ps. 69:16-18; Matt. 19:21-22,27-29; Mark 10:21-22; Luke 18:22-23; Acts 20:24; Rom. 6:2,11; Gal. 6:14; Phil. 3:7-8; Col. 3:3-5
Quiet time reflection:
    What am I holding on to that I should release? CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Hallesby: the true battleground

Sunday, February 18, 2024
Meditation:
The LORD has heard my cry for mercy;
    the LORD accepts my prayer.
    —Psalm 6:9 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The secret prayer chamber is a bloody battleground. Here violent and decisive battles are fought out. Here the fate of souls for time and eternity is determined, in quietude and solitude.
    To pray is to open one’s heart to Jesus.
    ... O. Hallesby (1879-1961), Prayer, London: Inter-Varsity Fellowship, 1943, reprint, Augsburg Fortress Books, 1975, 1994, p. 98 (see the book)
    See also Ps. 6:9; Luke 18:1-8; Acts 1:14; Rom. 8:26-27; Gal. 4:6; Eph. 6:18; 1 Thess. 5:17; Jude 1:20
Quiet time reflection:
    Is my heart truly open to God through Christ? CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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