Piper: the center

Thursday, November 14, 2024
    Commemoration of Samuel Seabury, First Anglican Bishop in North America, 1796
Meditation:
The LORD is King for ever and ever;
    the nations will perish from his land.
    —Psalm 10:16 (NIV)
Quotation:
    If we would meet God in worship, there is only one place we must go, to Jesus Christ. Christianity has no geographical center like Islam and Judaism... He came into the world to explode geographical limitation. There is no temple now. Jerusalem is not the center. Christ is.
    ... John S. Piper (b. 1946), Fifty Reasons Why Jesus Came to Die, Crossway, 2006, p. 69 (see the book)
    See also Ps. 10:16; 2:8; 110:1; 139:7-10; Dan. 7:14; John 4:23-24; Acts 2:32-36; 17:27-28; 1 Cor. 15:24-27; Phil. 2:9-11; Heb. 12:2; 2 Pet. 1:17; Rev. 11:15; 19:16; 21:22-24
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your presence and authority are boundless. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Simeon: humility

Wednesday, November 13, 2024
    Feast of Charles Simeon, Pastor, Teacher, 1836
Meditation:
    Once I was alive apart from law; but when the commandment came, sin sprang to life and I died. I found that the very commandment that was intended to bring life actually brought death.
    —Romans 7:9-10 (NIV)
Quotation:
    We cannot have one spark of real humility till we are abased before God, as guilty, helpless, and undone creatures, who have no hope but in the tender mercy of God in Christ Jesus. We must, as far as respects all hope in ourselves, feel ourselves in the very condition of the fallen angels, whose sin we have followed, and whose punishment we are doomed to share. Indeed, indeed, this is our very state, whether we know it or not: and it becomes us to seek the knowledge of it, and to live under a sense of it every day, and all the day long. We should never appear either before God or man in any other dress than this.
    ... Charles Simeon (1759-1836), Horae Homileticae, v. XX, London: Holdsworth and Ball, 1833, p. 270 (see the book)
    See also Rom. 7:9-10; Isa. 6:5; Eph. 2:12-13; Heb. 11:1; 1 Pet. 1:3-5
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, there is no hope for me apart from You. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Fenelon: God speaking within

Tuesday, November 12, 2024
Meditation:
    For the word of God is living and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.
    —Hebrews 4:12 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Let us recognize, then, the fact that God is incessantly speaking in us. He speaks in the impenitent also, but, stunned by the noise of the world and their passions, they cannot hear Him; the interior voice is to them a fable. He speaks in awakened sinners; they are sensible of remorse of conscience, which is the voice of God reproaching them inwardly for their sins. When they are deeply moved, they have no difficulty in understanding about this interior voice, for it is it that pierces them so sharply. It is in them that two-edged sword of which Paul speaks as piercing even to the dividing asunder of soul and spirit.
    ... François Fénelon (1651-1715), Spiritual Progress: or, Instructions in the Divine Life of the Soul, New York: M. W. Dodd, 1853, p. 91-92 (see the book)
    See also Heb. 4:12; 1 Kings 19:11-12; Ps. 119:130; Eccl. 12:11; Isa. 55:10-11; Jer. 17:10; Matt. 13:18-23; Rom. 1:16; 2 Cor. 10:4-5; Eph. 6:17; 1 Thess. 2:13; 1 Pet. 1:23; Rev. 1:16
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your word is a reproach to my life. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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Phillips: God with us

Monday, November 11, 2024
    Feast of Martin, Monk, Bishop of Tours, 397
Meditation:
    And this was [John’s] message: “After me will come one more powerful than I, the thongs of whose sandals I am not worthy to stoop down and untie. I baptize you with water, but he will baptize you with the Holy Spirit.”
    —Mark 1:7-8 (NIV)
Quotation:
    We rejoice in the fact that God has actually been here—and that is one half of the meaning of Advent.
    ... J. B. Phillips (1906-1982), Good News: Thoughts on God and Man, New York: Macmillan, 1963, p.158 (see the book)
    See also Mark 1:7-8; Isa. 7:14; 9:6; Mark 13:34-37; Luke 2:20
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, You are the true man. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
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