Aug 24
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The voice from the cross did not summon men to do, but
to be satisfied with what was done, “It is finished.” The sacrifice of
the Lord Jesus Christ is the only perfect thing which has ever
been presented to God on man’s behalf. “It shall be perfect to be
accepted; there shall be no blemish therein” (Leviticus 22:21).
-Scott Richardson
When God intends to fill a soul, he first makes it empty. When He intends to enrich a soul, He first makes it poor. When He intends to exalt a soul, He first makes it sensible to its own miseries, wants, and nothingness.
~John Flavel (c1627-1691)
The Justice of God
The JUSTICE OF GOD is in itself a great barrier to the
salvation of a sinner. Because God is just, our sins must be
punished. Never has there been a sin pardoned without
atonement since the world began. There has never been a sin
remitted by the great Judge of heaven until justice has been fully
satisfied.
How, then, can a sinner be saved? This is the great riddle
of the law and the grand discovery of the gospel. The answer is,
God’s justice has been fully satisfied through the substitution of
our Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ (Isa. 45:22; Rom. 3:26).
He died “the just for the unjust” (1 Peter 3:18) that He
might bring us to God. Through the obedience and death of our
Lord on our behalf, God can be just and justify the believer.
-Henry Mahan
When Christ cried from Calvary’s cross, “It is finished,” He
could have cried, “God is satisfied,” and it would have meant the
exact same thing.
-David Eddmenson
“Prisoners of Hope”
“Turn you to the strong hold, ye prisoners of hope: even to day do I declare that I will render double unto thee.” (Zechariah 9:12)
Once the Spirit of God reveals Christ in us, once he gives us a confident, lively assurance of faith and an assured hope before God, we are still, as long as we live in this body of flesh, “prisoners of hope.” I find within me “the company of two armies” constantly at war. When I would do good, evil is present with me (Song of Solomon 6:13; Romans 7:14-23; Galatians 5:16-17). Child of God, is it not so with you? Are you not constantly constrained, with the Apostle, to declare, “By the grace of God I am what I am.”
A Prisoner
That is not merely my doctrinal confession. It is my daily experience. Try as I may I cannot pray, except he put a prayer in my heart. I read the Book of God, but I cannot hear his voice except he speak by his Word. I cannot call upon him except he call me. I cannot run after him except he draw me. I cannot turn to him except he turn me. I cannot seek him except he seek me. I cannot worship him except he inspire worship in me. I cannot speak to him until he speaks to me. I cannot hold him except he hold me by his grace. I cannot resist the slightest temptation except he save me from the tempter’s power. I cannot but fall except he uphold me by the right hand of his righteousness. When I fall, I cannot cease from my downward spiral of iniquity except he stretch out his arm and catch me in his mighty hand. When I am fallen, I cannot get up except he pick me up and cause me to stand.
A Prisoner of Hope
Yes, we are prisoners in these houses of clay; but blessed be his name, we are Christ’s prisoners, and we are “prisoners of hope,” and ours is “a good hope through grace,” because Christ is our Hope. He “is the Hope of Israel, and the Saviour thereof” (Jeremiah 14:8). We have been begotten of God by the resurrection of Christ unto a living hope, and that living Hope is Christ himself living in us, “the Hope of glory.”
The hope of the hypocrite shall be cut off, and his trust shall be as a spider’s web” (Job 7:14). But Christ our Hope “ maketh not ashamed, because the love of God is shed abroad in the heart by the Holy Ghost” (Romans 5:5; Lamentations 3:21-26). — “This I recall to my mind, therefore have I hope. The Lord is my Portion.” Our hope is his mercy. We are “looking for the mercy of our Lord Jesus Christ unto eternal life.” Our hope is his great compassion. Our hope is his faithfulness. Our hope is his great goodness. Our hope is his salvation.
How delightful, how blessed it is while in this prison, ever to turn to the Stronghold Christ Jesus. Though I am a prisoner in this body of flesh, I am a prisoner of hope; and my hope I shall enjoy. I hope, at last, to be presented by God my Saviour, faultless before the presence of his glory with exceeding joy!
Don Fortner
OUR BLESSED, MYSTERIOUS UNION
“We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bones.” Ephesians 5:30
Child of God, can you begin to imagine what this text teaches? There is a living, loving, and lasting union between the Lord Jesus Christ and all his people. It is beyond imagination, but it is true -We are One with our Redeemer! What does this imply?
Certainly, it implies A Similarity Of Nature between Christ and his church. By the incarnation our Lord assumed our nature. He is God the Eternal Son. But he is also a real man. As a man, he lived in perfect righteousness, died as our Substitute, arose from the grave, and reigns in glory. Ever rejoice in the eternal Deity of Christ; but never forget that your Saviour is a real man. And by the new birth the Son of God has given us his nature. We are “partakers of the divine nature.” Christ bears our nature in heaven, and we bear his nature upon the earth. The text also implies An Intimate Relationship. We are wed to the God-man! We cannot understand this relationship, but we can enjoy it. Christ espoused us to be his bride before the world began. He redeemed us for himself He prepared our wedding garments. He allured us into the wilderness and there won our hearts by his all-prevailing love. My God, my Maker, my Redeemer, my Saviour, my King is also my Husband. “Let him kiss me with the kisses of his mouth; his love is better than wine.” Again, the text implies A Mysterious Origin. As Eve was taken from the side of Adam, the church was born from the bleeding side of Christ, the Second Adam. He died that we might live. And these words imply A Loving Possession. We belong to Christ. “Ye are not your own, ye are bought with a price.” For many years we lie in the arms of another. But all the while we belonged to him who loved us, chose us, and redeemed us. Once more, our text implies A Vital Union. “We are members of his body.” Those words imply much more than unity. They imply identity. We are One With Christ! He must have us. The Head cannot be complete without his body. The King must have his subjects. The Shepherd must have his sheep. This is a vital union. Christ MUST have his redeemed ones. And we MUST have him.
“We are members of his body, of his flesh, and of his bone.” What does this union secure for us? It secures eternal salvation, absolute safety, and the perfection of eternal glory. The Lord will not share his glory with another. But we are one with him. And WE SHALL HAVE THE VERY GLORY OF CHRIST
DON FORTNER
Your Saviour-God has married you!
(John MacDuff, “The Faithful
Promiser”)
“And I will betroth thee unto Me for ever!” Hosea
2:19
How wondrous and varied are the figures which Jesus employs to
express the tenderness of His covenant love! My soul! your Saviour-God
has married you! Would you know the TIME of your betrothal? Go back
into the depths of a by-past eternity, before the world was; then and there,
your espousals were contracted: “I have loved you with an everlasting
love!”
Soon shall the bridal-hour arrive, when your absent Lord shall come to welcome
His betrothed bride into His royal palace! At “midnight!” (the hour
when He is least expected) the cry may be — shall be heard, “Behold, the
Bridegroom comes!”
My soul! has this mystic union been formed between you and
your Lord? Can you say, in humble assurance of your faith in Him, “My
beloved is mine — and I am His!” If so, great, unspeakably great
are the glories which await you! Your dowry, as the bride of Christ
— is all that Omnipotence can bestow — and all that a
glorified bride can receive! In the prospect of those glorious
nuptials, you need dread no pang of widowhood. What God has joined together, no
created power can put asunder! He betroths you, and it is, “forever!”
The free, sovereign grace of God!
(Octavius Winslow,
“Christ, Our Righteousness”)
“Those who He did predestinate, them He also called;
and whom He called, them He also justified;
and whom He justified, them He also glorified.”
Romans 8:30
The justified sinner stands the closest to God,
of any created being in the universe. Nearer
to the throne of the Eternal, he cannot stand.
What marvellous love!
Who will dare assert that salvation is not,
from first to last—of free, sovereign grace!
Let your eye pierce the veil which falls between
earth and heaven. Behold that shining, worshiping
being, standing so near to the throne of glory,
bathed in the overpowering effulgence of its rays!
Who is he?
He was once a sinner upon earth, the vilest
of his race, the dishonoured of his generation,
forsaken by man—and abhorred of God.
But Jesus met him, and divine love drew him, and
sovereign grace rescued, pardoned, and saved him!
And now washed from all his guilt by the blood,
freed from all condemnation by the righteousness
of Christ—he stands before the throne “blameless,”
a “king and a priest unto God.” Such is the great
love of Jesus! And all this grace, and all this
glory, and all this bliss—flows from the free,
sovereign grace of God!
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Eternal love! -Spurgeon’s sermon, “Good Cheer for Christmas” Every child of God is the object of eternal love– love without beginning and without end. This is one of the fat things full of marrow. Is it so, that I, a believer in Jesus, unworthy as I am, am the object of the eternal love of God? What transport lies in that thought! Long before the Lord began to create the world, he had thought of me. Long before Adam fell or Christ was born, and the angels sung their first choral over Bethlehem’s miracle, the eye and the heart of God were towards his elect people. He never began to love them, they were always “a people near unto him.” Is it not so written-“I have loved you with an everlasting love, therefore, with lovingkindness have I drawn you”? |
How wide, how long, how high, and how deep His love is!
C.H.Spurgeon
“may be able to comprehend with all saints what is the
breadth, and length, and depth, and height; 19 and to
know the love of Christ, which passeth knowledge, that ye might be filled with
all the fulness of God.” Ephesians 3:18-19
The love of Christ in its sweetness, its fullness, its greatness, its
faithfulness, surpasses all human comprehension. Where shall language be found
which could describe His matchless, His unparalleled love towards His redeemed
people? It is so vast and boundless that, as the swallow but skims the
water, and dives not into its depths-so all descriptions of Jesus but touch the
surface, while immeasurable depths lie beneath. Well might the poet say,
“O love-you fathomless abyss!” for this love of Christ is
indeed measureless and fathomless; none can attain
unto it!
Before we can have any right idea of the love of Jesus, we must understand His
previous glory in His height of majesty-and His humiliation upon
the earth in all its depths of shame.
But who can fathom the majesty and glory of
Christ, when . . .
He was enthroned in the highest heavens;
He was very God of very God;
He made the heavens and all the hosts thereof;
His own almighty arm upheld the spheres;
the full chorus of the hallelujahs of the universe unceasingly flowed to
the foot of His throne;
He reigned supreme above all His creatures, as God over all, blessed
forever!
Who can fathom His height of glory then?
And who, on the other hand, can fathom how low He descended?
To become a man was something-to be a man of sorrows was
far more.
To bleed, and die, and suffer-these were much for Him who was the Son of God;
but to suffer such unparalleled agony, to endure a death of shame and desertion
by His Father-this is a depth of condescending love which the most inspired
mind must utterly fail to penetrate!
Herein is love! and truly it is love that surpasses knowledge!
O let His love for such unworthy sinners as us, fill our hearts with adoring
gratitude.
So mighty — yet so loving!
(John MacDuff, “Ripples in the
Twilight” 1885)
What a wonderful Saviour! So mighty — yet so loving!
Spurning, indeed, all baseness and vileness, all mere lip-homage and
hypocrisy.
Upsetting all false human ideals and empty philosophies.
At war with conventional empty religious rituals.
Denouncing every white-washed sepulchre that serves only to screen spiritual
rottenness.
But welcoming . . .
many of those who were looked at askance by their fellows;
some who were the subjects of social ostracism;
those deemed fit only to be trampled, as bruised battered flowers,
underneath the feet;
the repentant harlot and sinner, the prodigal, the outcast, the lost.
His heart is a very hive of tenderness . . .
washing His disciples’ feet in token of humility;
standing by the grave of buried affection;
wiping away the tear of bereavement;
calming the paroxysms of untold sorrow;
arrested by the penitential sighings of the contrite spirit.
In a word, imparting . . .
rest to the weary and heavy-laden,
hope to the desponding,
sympathy to the mourner,
healing to the brokenhearted; and
finally showing, in the scenes of Gethsemane and Calvary which
crowned that Incarnation of suffering love — what He the
Divine Man could do and dare for perishing sinners.
The kindness of the kindest on earth has a limit — His had
none.
Human affection and love may come and go — but His flows on forever!
“Yea, I have loved thee with an everlasting love; therefore with
lovingkindness have I drawn thee!” Jeremiah 31:3