성령 안에 있는 의와 평강과 희락(롬14:17)

THE REALM OF THE REAL “In your patience possess ye your souls.” Luke 21:19 When a man is born again, there is not the same robustness in his thinking or reasoning for a time as formerly. We have to make an expression of the new life, to form the mind of Christ. “Acquire your soul with patience.” Many of us prefer to stay at the threshold of the Christian life instead of going on to cons..

HIS AGONY AND OUR FELLOWSHIP “Then cometh Jesus with them unto a place called Gethsemane, and saith unto the disciples, . . . tarry ye here, and watch with Me.” Matthew 26:36, 38 We can never fathom the agony in Gethsemane, but at least we need not misunderstand it. It is the agony of God and Man in one, face to face with sin. We know nothing about Gethsemane in personal experience. Gethsem..

THOSE BORDERS OF DISTRUST “Behold, the hour cometh, . . . that ye shall be scattered.” John 16:32 Jesus is not rebuking the disciples, their faith was real, but it was disturbed; it was not at work in actual things. The disciples were scattered to their own interests, alive to interests that never were in Jesus Christ. After we have been perfectly related to God in sanctification, our faith..

“OUT OF THE WRECK I RISE” “Who shall separate us from the love of Christ?” Romans 8:35 God does not keep a man immune from trouble; He says─”I will be with him in trouble.” It does not matter what actual troubles in the most extreme form get hold of a man’s life, not one of them can separate him from his relationship to God. We are more than conquerors in all these things.” Pa..

CAREFUL UNREASONABLENESS “Behold the fowls of the air” . . . . “Consider the lilies of the field.” Matthew 6:26, 28 Consider the lilies of the field, how they grow, they simply are! Think of the sea, the air, the sun, the stars and the moon—all these are, and what a ministration they exert. So often we mar God’s designed influence through us by our self-conscious effort to be consis..

HIS ASCENSION AND OUR UNION “And it came to pass, while He blessed them, He was parted from them, and carried up into heaven.” Luke 24:51 We have no corresponding experience to the events in Our Lord’s life after the Transfiguration. From then onwards Our Lord’s life was altogether vicarious. Up to the time of the Transfiguration He had exhibited the normal perfect life of a man; from t..

THE HABIT OF WEALTH “Partakers of the divine nature.” 2 Peter 1:4 We are made partakers of the Divine nature through the promises; then we have to ‘manipulate’ the Divine nature in our human nature by habits, and the first habit to form is the habit of realizing the provision God has made. ‘Oh, I can’t afford it,’ we say—one of the worst lies is tucked up in that phrase. It is u..

THE HABIT OF RISING TO THE OCCASION “That ye may know what is the hope of His calling . . . .” Ephesians 1:18 Remember what you are saved for—that the Son of God might be manifested in your mortal flesh. Bend the whole energy of your powers to realize your election as a child of God; rise to the occasion every time. You cannot do anything for your salvation, but you must do something to m..

THE HABIT OF ENJOYING THE DISAGREEABLE “That the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh.” 2 Corinthians 4:10 We have to form habits to express what God’s grace has done in us. It is not a question of being saved from hell, but of being saved in order to manifest the life of the Son of God in our mortal flesh, and it is the disagreeable things which make us exhibit w..

THE HABIT OF A GOOD CONSCIENCE “A conscience void of offence toward God, and toward men.” Acts 24:16 God’s commands are given to the life of His Son in us, consequently to the human nature in which His Son has been formed, His commands are difficult, but immediately we obey they become divinely easy. Conscience is that faculty in me which attaches itself to the highest that I know, and te..