Jan 11
30
A question for streetlights. Isaiah 13: 10: For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light: the sun shall be darkened in his going forth, and the moon shall not cause her light to shine.
When I was a teenager growing up in the country I almost always had a million-candlepower spotlight in my truck. At night when I would visit a friend’s house in town we liked to shine that spotlight on the streetlight in front of his house. The spotlight was so overpowering it would make the streetlight go dark.
In the day of our Lord Jesus Christ’s return the stars, the sun, and the moon shall not give their light because of the preeminent Light of Christ. If that be the case between Christ and those celestial bodies, which even now outshine your little streetlight of so-called righteousness, then what shall be the case when you encounter Christ the Light?
Clay Curtis
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Your way, not mine, O Lord, However dark it be, Lead me by Your own hand Choose out the path for me.
“Smooth let it be, or rough, It will be still the best; Winding or straight, it leads Right onward to Your rest.
“I dare not choose my lot I would not, if I might, O choose for me, my God So shall I walk aright.”
“The kingdom that I seek Is Yours; so let the way That leads to it be Yours,Else I must surely stray.
“O take my cup, and it With joy or sorrow fill, As best to You may seem You choose my good and ill.
“O choose for me my friends, My sickness or my health O choose my cares for me, My poverty or wealth.
“Not mine, not mine the choice, In things either great or small, O be my Guide, my Strength, My Jesus, and my all.”
Octavius Winslow.
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THE PROMISES OF GOD
“For all of God’s promises have been fulfilled in him.” 2 Cor. 1:20
God has made a Will, or Testament, in behalf of His people! It is signed and sealed. It cannot be altered- nothing can divest us of our inheritance. The bequest is His own “exceeding great and precious promises.” What a heritage! All that the sinner requires- all that the sinner’s God can give. In this testamentary deed there are no contingencies- no peradventures. The testator commences it with the sure guarantee for its every jot and tittle being fulfilled, “Verily, verily, I say unto you!” He endorses every promise, and every page, with a “Yes, and Amen.” “God, willing more abundantly to show to the heirs of promise the immutability of His counsel, confirmed it by an oath.” But, who provided such a rich Promise Treasury? What is the source, where is the fountain-head, from which these streams of mercy flow to the Church? “In HIM.” Believer! from Jesus every promise is derived- in Jesus every promise centres. Pardon, peace, adoption, consolation, eternal life- all “in Him.” In Him you are “chosen,” “called,” “justified,” “sanctified,” and “glorified.” You have in possession all the blessings of present grace; you have in reserve all the happiness of coming glory. And “He is faithful that promised.”
Your friend may deceive you- the world has deceived you- He never will! Myriads in glory, are there to tell how not one thing has failed of all that the Lord their God has spoken. Rely on this faithfulness. He gave His Son for you. After the greater blessing, surely, for subordinate ones, you may trust Him. And where do these promises beam most brightly? Like the stars, it is in the night! In the midnight of trial- when the sun of earthly prosperity has set- when deep is calling to deep, and wave to wave; when tempted, bereaved, beaten down with “a great fight of afflictions,” the spiritual firmament with its galaxy of Promises is brightest and clearest!
“Oh! who could bear life’s stormy doom, Did not Your Word of Love
Come brightly bearing through the gloom A palm branch from above?
Then sorrow touched by You grows bright, With more than rapture’s ray;
As darkness shows us worlds of light We never saw by day!”
But do not be deceived; the night of sorrow cannot ‘in itself’ give you the comfort of the Divine Promises. It may be night, and yet the stars invisible. It is only “in Him” these promises can be discerned in their lustre. Reader! if you are “out of Christ,” these stars of Gospel promise shine in vain to you; they have, to the unspiritual eye, no beauty or brightness. In the midnight battle of Barak, “the stars in their course fought against Sisera.” They shone on Israel, but denied their light to the enemies of God. The guiding pillar, so lustrous to the chosen people, was a column of portentous gloom to Pharaoh’s host. But “in Him,” as “heirs of God,” you are inheritors of “all the promises.” All the promises! Oh! with such a pillow whereon to rest your aching head, you may well resume your nightly song– “I will lie down and sleep in peace, for you alone, O Lord, make me dwell in safety.” Psalm 4:8 John MacDuff.
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The Great Darkness Of Light
Tommy Robbins
“But if thine eye be evil, thy whole body shall be full of darkness. If therefore the light that is in thee be darkness, how great is that darkness!” Matthew 6:23
The eye that cannot see is in bondage to that which is within. Someone that has never had the gift of sight has no visual concept of anything outside himself. Therefore there is nothing but darkness. This condition is so natural and fixed that this is the way of life for him. There is no hope for anything different except for a miracle. And even then this must be wrought by a power other than his own.
This is the case of all mankind Spiritually. How great is that darkness? Complete! No light at all! The Spiritual light that is in man by virtue of our fallen nature is great and total darkness. Newton described it this way – “I once was lost, but now am found; Was blind, but now I see”. This great darkness can only be attributed to blindness. The only way that this horrible condition can be reversed is by a miracle of God’s grace – AMAZING GRACE! Those who live and remain in darkness cannot see the light of the glorious gospel of Jesus Christ. They cannot see the truth of God. They cannot see Christ crucified. They cannot see themselves in the light of God’s Word.
Spiritual blindness is far greater and worse than physical blindness. Those who are Spiritually blind would have it no other way. They love it! – “This is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.” John 3:19. A sight of the Lord Jesus Christ is the last thing they want. But, thanks be unto God, if and when Christ reveals Himself to them, He is all they want! A sight of HIM makes all the difference between great darkness and great light. How great is THAT LIGHT? – “For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.” 2Co 4:6 – GREATER THAN THE DARKNESS!
Psalm 130:6 (King James Version)
6My soul waiteth for the Lord more than they that watch for the morning: I say, more than they that watch for the morning.
2 Samuel 22:29 (King James Version)
29For thou art my lamp, O LORD: and the LORD will lighten my darkness
Psalm 36:9 (King James Version)
9For with thee is the fountain of life: in thy light shall we see light.
Isaiah 9:2 (King James Version)
2The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.
2 Corinthians 4:6 (King James Version)
6For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
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God’s Light on Dark Clouds Theodore Cuyler, 1882.
Today as I sit in my lonely room, this passage of God’s Word flies in like a white dove through the window, “And now men see not the sun which is in the clouds; but the wind passes and clears them.” Job 37:21. To my weak vision, dimmed with tears, the cloud is exceeding dark, but through it stream some rays from the infinite love which fills the Throne with an exceeding and eternal brightness of glory. By-and-by we may get above and behind that cloud—into the overwhelming light. We shall not need comfort then; but we do need it now. And for our present consolation, God lets through the clouds some clear, strong, distinct rays of love and gladness.
One truth which beams in through the vapours is this—God not only reigns, but He governs His world by a most beautiful law of compensations. He sets one thing over against another. Faith loves to study the illustrations of this law, notes them in her diary, and rears her pillars of praise for every fresh discovery. I have noticed that the deaf often have an unusual quickness of eyesight; the blind are often gifted with an increased capacity for hearing; and sometimes when the eye is darkened and the ear is closed, the sense of touch becomes so exquisite that we are able to converse with the sufferer through that sense alone.
This law explains why God put so many of His people under a sharp regimen of hardship and burden-bearing in order that they may be sinewed into strength; why a Joseph must be shut into a prison in order that he may be trained for a palace and for the premiership of the kingdom.
Outside of the Damascus Gate I saw the spot where Stephen was stoned in a cruel death; but that martyr blood was not only the “seed of the Church,” but the first germ of conviction in the heart of Saul of Tarsus. This law explains the reason why God often sweeps away a Christian’s possessions—in order that he may become rich in faith, and why He dashes many people off the track of prosperity, where they were running at fifty miles an hour, in order that their pride might be crushed, and that they might seek the safer track of humility and holy living.
[What a wondrous compensation our bereaved nation is receiving, for the loss of him who was laid the other day in his tomb by the lakeside! That cloud is already raining blessings, and richer showers may be yet to come.]
God’s people are never so exalted as when they are brought low, never so enriched as when they are emptied, never so advanced as when they are set back by adversity, never so near the crown as when under the cross.
One of the sweetest enjoyments of heaven, will be to review our own experiences under this law of compensations, and to see how often affliction worked out for us the exceeding weight of glory. There is a great lack in all God’s people who have never had the education of sharp trial. There are so many graces that can only be pricked into us by the puncture of suffering, and so many lessons that can only be learned through tears—that when God leaves a Christian without any trials, He really leaves him to a terrible danger. His heart, unploughed by discipline, will be very apt to run to the tares of selfishness and worldliness and pride.
In a musical instrument there are some keys that must be touched in order to evoke its fullest melodies; God is a wonderful organist, who knows just what heart-chord to strike. In the Black Forest of Germany a baron built a castle with two lofty towers. From one tower to the other he stretched several wires, which in calm weather were motionless and silent. When the wind began to blow, the wires began to play like an aeolian harp. As the wind rose into a fierce gale, the old baron sat in his castle and heard his mighty hurricane-harp playing grandly over the battlements. Just so, while the weather is calm and the skies clear, a great many of the emotions of a Christian’s heart are silent. As soon as the wind of adversity smites the chords, the heart begins to play; and when God sends a hurricane of terrible trial—you will hear strains of submission and faith, and even of sublime confidence and holy exultation, which could never have been heard in the calm hours of prosperity.
Oh, brethren, let the winds smite us, if they only make the spices flow! Let us not shrink from the deepest trial, if at midnight we can only sing praises to God. If we want to know what clouds of affliction mean and what they are sent for, we must not flee away from them in fright with closed ears and bandaged eyes. Fleeing from the cloud is fleeing from the Divine love that is behind the cloud.
In one of the German picture-galleries is a painting called “Cloudland”; it hangs at the end of a long gallery, and at first sight it looks like a huge repulsive daub of confused colour, without form or loveliness. As you walk towards it the picture begins to take shape; it proves to be a mass of exquisite little cherub faces. If you come close to the picture, you see only an innumerable company of little angels and cherubim! How often the soul that is frightened by trial sees nothing but a confused and repulsive mass of broken expectations and crushed hopes! But if that soul, instead of fleeing away into unbelief and despair, would only draw up near to God, it would soon discover that the cloud was full of angels of mercy. In one cherub-face it would see “Those whom I love—I chasten.” Another angel would say, “All things work together for good to those who love God.” In still another sweet face the heavenly words are coming forth, “Let not your heart be troubled; believe also in Me. In my Father’s house are many mansions. Where I am—there shall you be also.” Today my lonely room is vocal with such heavenly utterances.
God’s ways are not my ways—but they are infinitely better. The cloud is not so dense but love-rays shine through. In time the revealing “winds shall clear” away the dark and dreadful mystery. Kind words of sympathy steal into the shadowed room of suffering. If Christ does not come in visible form to our Bethanys, He sends His faithful servants and handmaidens with words of warm, tender condolence.
The fourteenth chapter of John never gleams with such a celestial brightness, as when we read it when under the cloud. No cloud can be big enough to shut out heaven—if we keep the eye towards the Throne. And when we reach heaven and see the cloud from God’s side—it will be blazing and beaming with the illumination of His love. The Lamb who is in the midst of the throne shall be our Shepherd, and shall guide us to fountains of waters of life, and God shall wipe away every tear from our eyes!