Boldness enables Christians to forsake all rather than Christ, and to prefer to offend all rather than to offend Him
“True boldness for Christ transcends all, it is indifference to the displeasure of either friends or foes. Boldness enables Christians to forsake all rather than Christ, and to prefer to offend all rather than to offend Him”
Jonathan Edwards Continue reading “Jonathan Edward”
Praying people want all that God has in store for them
“I thank God, whom I serve from my forefathers with pure conscience, that without ceasing I have remembrance of thee in my prayers night and day” 2 Timothy 1:3
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“Praying people want all that God has in store for them. They are not satisfied with a low religious life; superficial, vague and indefinite.
Praying people constantly strive for more. They are not after being saved from some sin, but saved from all sin, both inward and outward.
They are not only after deliverance from sinning, but from sin itself, from its being, its power and its pollution. They are after holiness of heart and life.”
E.M. Bounds
“In the twilight of life, God will not judge us on our earthly possession and human success, but rather on how much we have loved”
St. John of the Cross
“But when the morning was now come,
Jesus stood on the shore.”
John 21:4
The long night seasons of life with its discouragement and shattered dreams lay heavy upon the souls of His disciples. Each in their own way had failed to stand in the great testing and trial of the crucifixion of Jesus. Each one fled in the face of the fury and hatred of the moment. No one had felt the bitter sting more than Peter whose grandiose confession seemed to be so genuine and bold just a few short days before.
In their discouragement they had returned to their former occupation with an inner desolation and a sense of hopelessness. It is here that Jesus appears and meets them in the morning hours. It is here, though at first hidden from their eyes, He first comes to bring the power and hope of His resurrection. It is in His resurrection we have hope to arise from the fresh failures of life. It is in His resurrection we can feel Him invigorating our hearts and our hopes, moving us forward unto a greater sense of His purpose in our lives.
Though the nights be long, our efforts seem futile, and the world about seems not to even notice the starless sky, Jesus will come in the morning; and in His coming the fires of our hearts are rekindled. Rest assured He keeps His own. He watches over the objects of His Love even though the night is dark and the way seems uncertain, He will come with the wonder of His presence and, though we may not recognize Him at first, the truth will dawn and joy will break over our hearts as the morning sun upon the mountains.
“…weeping may endure for a night,
but joy cometh in the morning”
Psalm 30:5
Brian Troxel
“…in our day Christ as the truth has… been abolished: we take Christ’s teaching – but abolish Christ. We want truth the easy way. This is to abolish truth, for Christ the teacher is more important than the teaching… Truth is not a sum of statements, not a definition, not a system of concepts, but a life. Truth is not a property of thought that guarantees validity to thinking. No, truth in its most essential character is the reduplication of truth within yourself… Your life expresses the truth in the striving… The Gospel says that this is eternal life, to know the only true God and the One Whom He sent, the Truth (Jn. 17:3).”
Soren Kierkegaard
