Bunyan: our Advocate

Sunday, August 31, 2025
    Feast of Aidan, Bishop of Lindisfarne, Missionary, 651
    Commemoration of Cuthburga, Founding Abbess of Wimborne, c.725
    Commemoration of John Bunyan, Spiritual Writer, 1688
Meditation:
    Now there have been many of those priests, since death prevented them from continuing in office; but because Jesus lives forever, he has a permanent priesthood. Therefore he is able to save completely those who come to God through him, because he always lives to intercede for them.
    —Hebrews 7:23-25 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The advocateship of Jesus Christ declares us to be sorry creatures; for that office does, as it were, predict that some time or other we shall basely fall, and by falling be undone, if the Lord Jesus stand not up to plead. And as it shows this concerning us, so it shows concerning God that he will not lightly or easily lose his people. He has provided well for us—blood to wash us in; a priest to pray for us, that we may be made to persevere; and, in case we foully fall, an advocate to plead our cause, and to recover us from under, and out of all that danger, that by sin and Satan, we at any time may be brought into.
    ... John Bunyan (1628-1688), “The Work of Jesus Christ as an Advocate”, in The Whole Works of John Bunyan, v. I, London: Blackie, 1862, p. 157-158 (see the book)
    See also Heb. 7:23-25; Ps. 23:3; Lam. 3:58; Rom. 8:34; 1 Tim. 2:5-6; 1 John 2:1
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord Jesus, You are my only recourse. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    inst    Jonah    ; Ruth

Ryle: proof of conversion

Saturday, August 30, 2025
Meditation:
    The Lord told [Ananias], “Go to the house of Judas on Straight Street and ask for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying.”
    —Acts 9:11 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Of all the evidences of the real work of the Spirit, a habit of hearty private prayer is one of the most satisfactory that can be named. A man may preach from false motives. A man may write books and make fine speeches and seem diligent in good works, and yet be a Judas Iscariot. But a man seldom goes into his closet, and pours out his soul before God in secret, unless he is in earnest. The Lord himself has set his stamp on prayer as the best proof of true conversion.
    ... J. C. Ryle (1816-1900), A Call to Prayer, published in the 1850’s as a pamphlet, American Tract Society, 1867, p. 10 (see the book)
    See also Acts 9:11; Deut. 4:29; Ps. 32:6; 130:1-3; Pr. 15:8; Jon. 2:2; Luke 11:9-10; Acts 2:21; 1 Thess. 5:17
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, open my heart. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    inst    Jonah    ; Ruth

Bruce: praying for the unlikeable

Friday, August 29, 2025
Meditation:
    ... pray for them which despitefully use you.
    —Luke 6:28 (KJV)
Quotation:
    Persistence in prayer for someone whom we don’t like, however much it goes against the grain to begin with, brings about a remarkable change in attitude.
    ... F. F. Bruce (1910-1990), Hard Sayings of the Bible, InterVarsity Press, 2009, p. 364 (see the book)
    See also Luke 6:27-28; 23:34; Acts 7:60; Rom. 12:14; 1 Cor. 4:12-13; Jas. 3:9-10; 1 Pet. 3:9
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, warm my heart towards those who are against me. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    inst    Jonah    ; Ruth

Augustine: from the beginning

Thursday, August 28, 2025
    Feast of Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, Teacher, 430
Meditation:
    For he chose us in him before the creation of the world to be holy and blameless in his sight. In love he predestined us to be adopted as his sons through Jesus Christ, in accordance with his pleasure and will—to the praise of his glorious grace, which he has freely given us in the One he loves.
    —Ephesians 1:4-6 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The love, therefore, wherewith God loveth, is incomprehensible and immutable. For it was not from the time that we were reconciled unto Him by the blood of His Son that He began to love us; but He did so before the foundation of the world, that we also might be His sons along with His Only-begotten, before as yet we had any existence of our own.
    ... St. Augustine of Hippo (354-430), Lectures or Tractates on the Gospel according to St. John, vol. ii, Marcus Dods, ed., as vol. xi of The Works of Aurelius Augustine, Bishop of Hippo, Edinbugh: T & T Clark, 1884, tract. CX.6, p. 460 (see the book)
    See also Eph. 1:4-6; Jer. 1:5; John 15:16; 17:20-23; Rom. 8:17; 2 Cor. 5:18-19; 1 John 4:19
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, I cannot comprehend Your love for me. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    inst    Jonah    ; Ruth

Tauler: receiving the Creator

Wednesday, August 27, 2025
    Feast of Monica, Mother of Augustine of Hippo, 387
Meditation:
    [John the Baptizer:] “He must become greater; I must become less.”
    —John 3:30 (NIV)
Quotation:
    Verily, if thou desirest to have the Creator of all creatures, thou must renounce all creatures; for it cannot be otherwise, but only insomuch as thy soul is emptied and bared; the less of the creature, the more of God: this is but a [fair] bargain.
    ... Johannes Tauler (ca. 1300-1361), The Inner Way, Sermon II (see the book)
    See also John 3:30; Isa. 9:7; 53:2-3; Luke 14:26; John 12:25; Acts 13:36-37; 1 Cor. 3:5; 2 Cor. 12:9; Phil. 2:5-7; Col. 1:18; Heb. 3:2-6
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, help me to discard love for the things of this world. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    inst    Jonah    ; Ruth

Tozer: no living like the world

Tuesday, August 26, 2025
Meditation:
    Peter and the other apostles replied: “We must obey God rather than men!”
    —Acts 5:29 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The Holy Spirit never enters a man and lets him live like the world. You can be sure of that.
    ... A. W. Tozer (1897-1963), from a sermon ca. 1930, (see the book)
    See also Acts 5:29; John 15:19; 17:14; Acts 2:17-18; Rom. 1:8; 2 Cor. 10:3-5; Jas. 1:27; 4:4; 1 Pet. 1:14; 2:11; 1 John 2:15-17; 4:1-6
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord, Your Spirit rejects the world’s ways. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    inst    Jonah    ; Ruth

Short: nominal Christians

Monday, August 25, 2025
Meditation:
    For to be sure, he was crucified in weakness, yet he lives by God’s power. Likewise, we are weak in him, yet by God’s power we will live with him to serve you.
    —2 Corinthians 13:4 (NIV)
Quotation:
    The nominal Christian, then, will see Jesus as a name, a representative, a symbol, a personification, a prototype, a figure, a model, an exemplar for something else. The nominal Christian pays homage to something about Jesus, rather than worshiping the man himself. For this reason, nominal Christians will extol the moral teachings of Jesus, the faith of Jesus, the personality of Jesus, the compassion of Jesus, the world view of Jesus, the self-understanding of Jesus, etc. None of these worships Jesus as the Christ, but only something about him, something peripheral to the actual flesh-and-blood man. This is why when the almighty God came into the world in Jesus, he came as the lowest of the low, as weakness itself, as a complete and utter nothing, in order that men would be forced into the crucial decision about him alone and would not be able to worship anything about him.
    ... Robert L. Short (1932-2009), The Parables of Peanuts [1968], New York: HarperCollins, 2002, p. 166-167 (see the book)
    See also 2 Cor. 13:4; Luke 2:6-7; 22:43-44; Rom. 6:8-11; 1 Cor. 15:43; 2 Cor. 4:7-11; 12:9-10; Phil. 2:5-8; Heb. 5:2
Quiet time reflection:
    Lord Jesus, it is You alone that I worship. CQOD    Blog    email    RSS
    search    script    mobile
sub    fb    twt    inst    Jonah    ; Ruth