Jesus = Life: by TA Sparks

 

I have come that they may have life. John 10:10

If, on the one hand, eternal Life operates to cut us off from our natural life as the basis of our relationship with God, on the other hand, it is perfectly wonderful what is done. It is "the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes." The Lord even comes in as our physical life to the doing of more than would have been possible to us at our best, and certainly far beyond the present possibility, because He has made us know that as men we are nothing, even at our best. Life does that. Life forces off one system and brings on another, making room for it as it goes.

That, I believe is what the Lord meant when He said, "I am come that they might have life, and that they might have it more abundantly" (John 10:10). We have thought that just to mean that we are to have abundance of exuberance. We are always asking for life more abundant that we might feel wonderfully elated and overflowing and energetic. The Lord is preeminently practical, and more abundant Life means that, having Life, you will find the need of more to lead you a little further, and you will need it abundantly as you go on, because that Life alone can bring you into the fullness. And it is His will that there should be the full provision of Life unto the full end, because the purpose is such an abundant purpose. The Life is commensurate with the purpose.

 

When I Am Weak, Then Am I Strong: by AW Tozer

 

…For when I am weak, then am I strong. 2 Corinthians 12:10

Everything we need is found in Jesus Christ, the Son of God—and I think it is fair to say that we can never use all of the spiritual power and victory He is able to provide. He is all the guilty sinner needs and He is more than the fondest expectations of the loftiest saint!

If we are going to stand up for Jesus, it is good for us to remember how strong He is—and how weak we are! I settled this long ago. I tell you I have talked to God more than I have talked to anyone else and my conferences with Him have been longer than with anyone else.

I have told Him: “Now, Lord, if I say what I know in my heart I should say, and if I do what I know I should do, I will be in trouble with people and with groups.”

Then after praying more, I have said: “Almighty Lord, I accept this with my eyes open! I will not run. I will not hide. I will dare to stand up because I am on your side—and I know that when I am weak, then I am strong!”

So, I don’t let anyone praise me and I try not to pay attention to those who would blame me, for I am only a servant of the holiest man that ever walked the streets of Jerusalem—and they called Him a devil!

This is how I have learned to stand fast for Christ, and for all that He is to His own!

What is Church for? by TA Sparks

 

To those who believed in His name, He gave the right to become children of God – children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God. (John 1:12,13 NIV)

What, in the thought of God do Christians exist for? What does the Church exist for? There is only one answer. The existence and the function is to be an expression of Christ. There is nothing less and nothing more than that. Christ is the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, and all between! Let that be the starting point; let that be the governing rule and reality in all matters of life and work, and see at once the nature and vocation of the Church. This vast, incomprehensible heavenly system, of which Christ is the personal embodiment, touches every detail of life, personally and collectively. But remember only the Holy Spirit sees and knows how it is so; hence, as at the beginning, there has to be an utter submission to and direction by the Lordship of the Holy Spirit. What the bloodstream is to the human body, the Divine Life is to and in "the Church which is His body." What the nerve system is in the physical realm, the Holy Spirit is in the spiritual. Understand all the workings of those two systems in the natural, and you begin to see how God has written His great heavenly principles, first in the person of His Son, and then in His corporate Body.

As an individual believer is the result of a begetting, a conception, a formation, a birth and a likeness, so, in the New Testament, is a true local church. It is a reproduction of Christ by the Holy Spirit. Man cannot make, form, produce or "establish" this. Neither can anyone "join" or "enroll," or make himself or herself a member of this organism. First it is an embryo, and then a "formation" after Christ. So, all talk about "forming New Testament churches" is nonsense. The beginning is in a seeing of Christ.

Knowing God: by Henry Blackaby

 

And God spoke to Moses and said to him: “I am the LORD. I appeared to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob, as God Almighty, but by My name LORD I was not known to them.      Exodus 6:2-3

As God has walked with His people through the generations, He has progressively revealed His nature according to His purposes and the needs of His people. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob knew Him as God Almighty, because they needed His mighty power to protect them from their enemies. Moses and the Israelites learned that God was Lord, Master over every nation and every thing. God not only delivered them from the most powerful ruler in the world, but also brought them into the Promised Land. They came to experience Him as Lord, preeminently powerful over the pagan gods of their day.

God will continue to reveal His character to you according to your needs and according to His purposes. You will come to know more and more about Him as you obey Him. When you grieve, He will come to you as Comforter. When you are in need, He will demonstrate that He is the Provider. When you face a serious challenge, He will reveal that He is God Almighty.

Your understanding of God’s character ought to be greater now than when you first became a Christian. You ought to know Him today better than you did five years ago. Sadly, some Christians continue to live year after year with the same basic knowledge of God that they had when they first began walking with him. Whatever your present situation, view it in the light of what God is teaching you, through circumstances, about Himself and you will come to know God in dimensions you have never known Him before.

Mindfulness: by Sarah Young (JESUS Calling)

 Try to stay conscious of Me as you go step by step through this day. My Presence with you is both a promise and a protection. My final statement just before I ascended into heaven was: Surely I am with you always. That promise was for all of My followers, without exception.

     The promise of My Presence is a powerful protection. As you journey through your life, there are numerous pitfalls along the way. Many voices clamor for your attention, enticing you to go their way. A few steps away from your true path are pits of self-pity and despair, plateaus of pride and self-will. If you take your eyes off Me and follow another's way, you are in grave danger. Even well-meaning friends can lead astray if you let them usurp My place in your life. The way to stay on the path of Life is to keep your focus on Me. Awareness of My Presence is your best protection. 

Matthew 28:20
teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, to the end of the age.
Hebrews 12:1-2
¹ Therefore, since we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses, let us also lay aside every weight, and sin which clings so closely, and let us run with endurance the race that is set before us, ² looking to Jesus, the founder and perfecter of our faith, who for the joy that was set before him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is seated at the right hand of the throne of God.

No Secrets: by Henry Blackaby

 

For nothing is secret that will not be revealed, nor anything hidden that will not be known and come to light.      Luke 8:17

One of Satan’s subtle deceptions is that you can do things in secret that will never be revealed. This is simply not so. The Bible stresses that everything done in darkness will one day be brought to light. So before you commit yourself to do anything questionable, seriously ask yourself, “Am I willing for those around me to know what I am about to do? Am I willing for God to watch me participate in this activity?”

The knowledge that God sees what we do, the certainty that we are accountable for every word and action, ought to dissuade us from sin (2 Cor. 5:10). But we can become so alienated from God that even this knowledge does not deter us. God promises that He will publicly expose our sin so that we must give an account to others for our actions. Ultimately, everything we do will be exposed on judgment day.

Still, some people believe they can sin against God, their families, their employers, or their friends and never be discovered. God has provided a safeguard against sin: the certainty of disclosure. Scripture commands us to expose the deeds of darkness as we become aware of them (Eph. 5:11). As Christians we are to be the light that dispels darkness in our world. Sin cannot continue in the Christian’s experience, for light cannot dwell with darkness. The only insurance against having your sins exposed is living a blameless life.

DESIRE: by Sarah Young

 

Psalm 62:5-8
For God alone, O my soul, wait in silence, for my hope is from him.  He only is my rock and my salvation, my fortress; I shall not be shaken.  On God rests my salvation and my glory; my mighty rock, my refuge is God. Trust in him at all times, O people; pour out your heart before him; God is a refuge for us. Selah

Revelation 1:8
“I am the Alpha and the Omega,” says the Lord God, “who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty.”

I am the culmination of all your hopes and desires. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the first and the last: who is and was and is to come. Before you knew Me, you expressed your longing for Me in hurtful ways. You were ever so vulnerable to the evil around you in the world. But now My Presence safely shields you, enfolding you in My loving arms. I have lifted you out of darkness into My marvelous light.
     Though I have brought many pleasures into your life, not one of them is essential. Receive My blessings with open hands. Enjoy My good gifts, but do not cling to them. Turn your attention to the Giver of all good things, and rest in the knowledge that you are complete in Me. The one thing you absolutely need is the one things you can never lose. My Presence with you.

 I Peter 2:9
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;
 James 1:17
Every good gift and every perfect gift is from above, coming down from the Father of lights with whom there is no variation or shadow due to change.

Stick with Jesus: by TA Sparks

 

Look after each other so that none of you fails to receive the grace of God. Watch out that no poisonous root of bitterness grows up to trouble you, corrupting many. Hebrews 12:15

If we consider what were some of the practical factors in Christ's crucifixion we realize that His sufferings were caused by men's fickleness, bigotry, fearfulness, jealousy and treachery. In love He bore all these for us. And these may well be the factors which challenge the reality of our love to God. The fickle crowds so soon forgot the kindness and goodness of the Lord Jesus, allowing themselves to be carried away by base and false accusations, so that they cried out against the one whom they had formerly extolled and praised. The Pharisees were so dominated by a religious bigotry which was cruel in its intolerance and harsh in its legalistic denunciations that they took the lead in causing His sufferings. The disciples, as well as Pilate, were fearful; Judas was treacherous; and Satan was jealous himself and inspired jealousy in the Sadducees and others. But all this concentration of attacks upon love did not turn the Lord away from remaining faithful to the Father's will in every detail. God's love meant more to Him than the bitterness of enemies, the failure of friends, the strength of popular opinion or the matter of His own rights. When He came to rest in the glory of the Father's presence, love had conquered every temptation....
We, too, are confronted by some of the foes which He had to face, for we have been called to bear the Cross after Him. The fickleness of friends and fellow-workers, the bigoted criticism of those who claim to be God's servants, the fear-inspiring pressure of popular opinion, the misunderstanding and jealousy which Satan himself inspires – these are some of the tests put to our love. We can never hope to overcome them unless we remember that there is in the presence of God for us a Savior who suffered the full agony of these things, but accepted them as part of the cup which the Father had given Him to drink. It was love for the Father which enabled Him always to choose the Father's will, and the outcome of His triumph is that "we should be holy and without blemish before Him in love." There is a sense in which God is seeking to undo in us all that failure of love which we inherit from Adam. He exposes us to the painfulness of the Cross, not in some capricious or unsympathetic way, but because He aims to reproduce in us that love in fulfillment of His will which Christ already presents to Him on our behalf.

Real FREEDOM: by TA Sparks

 

By dying to what once bound us, we have been released from the law so that we serve in the new way of the Spirit, and not in the old way of the written code. Romans 7:6

Service begins with separation from the world, emancipation from the kingdom of this world, but it is a very thoroughgoing thing. Oh, that the church would recognize this, that God’s last word about this matter of emancipation and separation is “there shall not a hoof be left behind” (Ex. 10:26). You see, Moses’ service was a very thoroughgoing service, and it went that far, that not a hoof was left behind, and that is service to God. "See that the people are utterly out, and there is no link remaining."

Do remember that service is always governed by this: a deep inward separation. It is not enough for us to come out from the world and become parts of the people of God. Something more than that is necessary. The whole self-life in us has got to be definitely dealt with, and a great separation has to take place there. The impulsive, hot, fiery Moses has to become the quiet, patient, meek Moses... learning, perhaps above all things, meekness and patience. What a discipline of those forty years of self-emptying. Presently when he really enters upon his life’s work, his life service, one of the things that he will need most will be patience, and there is nothing more calculated to produce patience than the discipline of inaction. We do not learn patience when we can keep busy, when we can gratify all our impulses by doing something. But when we are not allowed to do anything, when we are cut off from ministry and work and service, and shut up to the discipline of inaction and the discipline of delay, God is preparing for better service than we would ever have fulfilled otherwise.

The Place of Ministry (by Prayer & Fasting): by Oswald Chambers

 

He said to them, "This kind [of unclean spirit] can come out by nothing but prayer and fasting." —Mark 9:29

“His disciples asked Him privately, ‘Why could we not cast it out?’ ” (Mark 9:28). The answer lies in a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. “This kind can come out by nothing but” concentrating on Him, and then doubling and redoubling that concentration on Him. We can remain powerless forever, as the disciples were in this situation, by trying to do God’s work without concentrating on His power, and by following instead the ideas that we draw from our own nature. We actually slander and dishonor God by our very eagerness to serve Him without knowing Him.

When you are brought face to face with a difficult situation and nothing happens externally, you can still know that freedom and release will be given because of your continued concentration on Jesus Christ. Your duty in service and ministry is to see that there is nothing between Jesus and yourself. Is there anything between you and Jesus even now? If there is, you must get through it, not by ignoring it as an irritation, or by going up and over it, but by facing it and getting through it into the presence of Jesus Christ. Then that very problem itself, and all that you have been through in connection with it, will glorify Jesus Christ in a way that you will never know until you see Him face to face.

We must be able to “mount up with wings like eagles” (Isaiah 40:31), but we must also know how to come down. The power of the saint lies in the coming down and in the living that is done in the valley. Paul said, “I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me” (Philippians 4:13) and what he was referring to were mostly humiliating things. And yet it is in our power to refuse to be humiliated and to say, “No, thank you, I much prefer to be on the mountaintop with God.” Can I face things as they actually are in the light of the reality of Jesus Christ, or do things as they really are destroy my faith in Him, and put me into a panic?

 

Helps For Time Alone With God: by Andrew Murray

 

 Though you have not seen him, you love him; and even though you do not see him now, you believe in him and are filled with an inexpressible and glorious joy, 1 Peter 1:8

BEGIN WITH PRAISE AND THANKSGIVING

    As you enter your quiet place to be alone with God, let your first work be to thank Him for the unspeakable love which invites you to come to Him, and to converse freely with Him. If your heart is cold and dead, remember that religion is not a matter of feeling, but has to do first with the will. Raise your heart to God, and thank Him for the assurance you have that He looks down on you and will bless you. Through such an act of faith you honor God, and draw your soul away from being occupied with itself.

    Think also of the glorious grace of the Lord Jesus, who is willing to teach you to pray, and to give you the disposition to do so. Think, too, of the Holy Spirit who was purposely given to cry "Abba, Father" in your heart, and to help your weakness in prayer (Rom. 8:15,26). Five minutes spent thus will strengthen your faith for your work in prayer. Once more I say – begin with an act of thanksgiving, and praise God for the quiet time with Him and the promise of blessing there.

PREPARE FOR PRAYER BY BIBLE STUDY

    It is helpful to prepare yourself for prayer by prayerful Bible Study. The great reason why the quiet time is not attractive is that people do not know how to pray. Their stock of words is soon exhausted, and they do not know what further to say because they forget that prayer is not a soliloquy, where everything comes from one side; but it is a dialogue, where God’s child listens to what the Father says, and replies to it, and then asks for the things he needs.

    Read a few verses from the Bible. Do not concern yourself with the difficulties contained in them. You can consider these later; but take what you understand, apply it to yourself, and ask the Father to make His Word light and power in your heart. Thus you will have material enough for prayer from the Word which the Father speaks to you; you will also have the liberty to ask for things you need. Keep on in this way, and the inner chamber will become at length not a place where you sigh and struggle only, but one of living fellowship with the Father in Heaven. Prayerful study of the Bible is indispensable for powerful prayer.

TURN TO PRAYER

    When you have thus received the Word into your heart, turn to prayer. But do not attempt it hastily or thoughtlessly, as though you knew well enough how to pray. Prayer in our own strength brings no blessing. Take time to present yourself reverently and in quietness before God. Remember His greatness and holiness and love. Think over what you wish to ask from Him. Do not be satisfied with going over the same things every day. No child goes on saying the same thing day after day to his earthly father.

    Conversation with the Father is colored by the needs of the day. Let your prayer be something definite, arising either out of the Word which you have read, or out of the real soul needs which you long to have satisfied. Let your prayer be so definite that you can say as you go out, "I know what I have asked from my Father, and I expect an answer." It is a good plan sometimes to take a piece of paper, and write down what you wish to pray for. You might keep such a paper for a week or more, and repeat prayers for the items until some new needs arise.

PRAY FOR NEEDS OF OTHERS

    What has been said is in reference to your own needs. But you know that we are allowed to pray that we may help also in the needs of others. One great reason why prayer in the secret place does not bring more joy and blessing is that it is too selfish, and selfishness is the death of prayer.

    Remember your family; your congregation, with its interests; your own neighborhood; and the church to which you belong. Let your heart be enlarged, and take up the interests of missions, and of the Church through the whole world. Become an intercessor, and you will experience for the first time the blessedness of prayer, as you find out that God will make use of you to share His blessing with others through prayer. You will begin to feel that there is something worth living for, as you find that you have something to say to God, and that He from heaven will do things in answer to your prayers which otherwise would not have been done.

    A child can ask his father for bread. A full-grown son converses with him about all the interests of his business, and about his further purposes. A weak child of God prays only for himself; a full-grown man in Christ understands how to consult with God over what must take place in the Kingdom. Let your prayer list bear the names of those for whom you pray – your minister, and all other ministers, and the different missionary affairs with which you are connected. Thus the secret place will become a wonder of God’s goodness, and a fountain of great joy. It will become the most blessed place on earth.

    It is a great thing to say, but it is the simple truth that God will make your secret place a Bethel, where His angels shall ascend and descend, and where you will cry out like Jacob, "The Lord shall be my God!" (Gen. 28:21). God will make it also Peniel, where you will see the face of God, as a prince of God, as one who wrestled with the angel, and overcame him (Gen. 32:24-30).

CARRY THE ATTITUDE OF THE QUIET TIME INTO YOUR DAY

    Do not forget the close bond between the personal time with God and the outer world. The attitude of the quiet time must remain with us all the day. The object of the time alone with God is so to unite us to God that we may have Him always abiding with us. Sin, thoughtlessness, yielding to the flesh or the world make us unfit for the quiet time and bring a cloud over the soul. If you have stumbled or fallen, return to the inner chamber, and let your first work be to invoke the blood of Jesus, and to claim cleansing by it. Rest not until by confession you have repented of and put away your sin. Let the precious blood give you a fresh freedom of approach to God. Remember that the roots of your life in the secret place strike far out in body and soul, so as to manifest themselves in business life.

    Let the obedience of faith in which you pray in secret rule you constantly. The secret place is intended to bind man to God, to supply him with power from God, to enable him to live for God alone. God be thanked for the inner chamber, and for the blessed life which He will enable us there to experience and nourish.