Days of Heaven Upon Earth Part 25

G.o.d will not have his service. The devil will monopolize him before he gets through. A divided heart loses both worlds. Saul tried it. Balaam tried it. Judas tried it, and they all made a desperate failure. Mary had but one choice. Paul said: "This one thing I do." "For me to live is Christ." Of such a life G.o.d says: "Because he hath set his love upon Me therefore will I deliver him. I will set him on high because he hath known My name." G.o.d takes a peculiar pride in showing His love to the heart that wholly chooses Him. Heaven and earth will fade away before its trust can be disappointed. Have we chosen Him only and given Him all our heart?

Say is it all for Jesus, As you so often sing?

Is He your Royal Master?

Is He your heart's dear King?

JUNE 17.

"The glory of the Lord shall be thy reward" (Isa. lviii. 8).

He comes by our side as our helper; nay, more. He comes to dwell within us; to be the life in our blood, the fire in our thought, the faith within us, both in inception and consummation. Thus He becomes not only the recompense of the victor, but the resources of the victory. He is the Captain and the Overcomer in our lives. If we have caught any help that has relieved us of a troubled morning, it has been of Him. He lifts our eyes up unto Himself and delivers us from apathy, from discontent and from fears. He is always the helper in this heavenly compet.i.tion, and will be the great reward in all the ages to come. If our life is hidden with Him we shall have to go through the same trials that He went through, but we shall not find them too hard. If once we take Him fully as the strength of our life, and our all in all, we shall be able to lay aside all the hindering things that press upon us day by day.

I have overcome, overcome, Overcome for thee, Thou shalt overcome, overcome, Overcome thro' Me.

JUNE 18.

"I am doing a great work, so that I cannot come down" (Neh. vi. 3).

When work is pressing there are many little things that will come and seem to need attention. Then it is a very blessed thing to be quiet and still, and work on, and trust the little things with G.o.d. He answers such trust in a wonderful way. If the soul has no time to fret and worry and harbor care, it has learned the secret of faith in G.o.d. A desperate desire to get some difficulty right takes the eye off of G.o.d and His glory. Some dear ones have been so anxious to get well, and have spent so much time in trying to claim it, that they have lost their spiritual blessing. G.o.d sometimes has to teach such souls that there must be a willingness to be sick before they are so thoroughly yielded as to receive His fullest blessing.

The enemy often keeps at this work. Sanballat came four times to Nehemiah and received always the same answer. It is best to stick to a good answer.

How many fears we have stopped to fight which have proved to be nothing at last. Nehemiah recognized that fear was sin, and did not dare to yield to it.

JUNE 19.

"Who hath first given to Him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again"

(Rom. xi. 35).

The Christian women of the world have it in their power, by a very little sacrifice, to add millions to the treasury of the Lord. Beloved sisters, have you found the joy of sacrifice for Jesus? Have you given up something that you might give it to Him? Are you giving your substance to Jesus? He will take it, and He will give you a thousandfold more. I should rather be connected with a work founded on great sacrifice than on enormous endowments. The reason G.o.d loved the place where His ancient temple rose in majesty was because there Abraham offered his son and David his treasure. The reason redemption is so dear to the Father and the heavenly world is because its foundation-stone is the Cross of Calvary. And the Christian life that is dearest to the heart of G.o.d, and will rise to the highest glory and usefulness, is the one whose foundation principle is sacrifice and self-renunciation. This is why the Master teaches us to give, because giving means loving, and love is but another name for life.

JUNE 20.

"Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he was called" (I. Cor.

vii. 20).

O ye who complain about your calling or fret about the changes and trials of life, how do you know but that these very changes are the divine methods by which G.o.d's purposes of blessing and usefulness concerning you be fulfilled? Had Aquila not been compelled to leave Rome and break up his home and business, he would probably have never met with Paul, and been called to the knowledge and service of Christ through this providential meeting. Had he not been a working man, and pursuing his ordinary avocation he would not have been brought into contact with the apostle. It was in the line of their calling, their common duties, and the providential changes of their life that G.o.d called them. And so He meets us. Do not try hard to run away from it, but, as the apostle has so finely put it, "Let every man abide in the same calling wherein he is called, let him therein abide with G.o.d." Make the most of your incidental opportunities.

JUNE 21.

"G.o.d hath set some in the church ... helps" (I. Cor. xii. 28).

In the apostle's lists of officers in the church the "helps" are mentioned before the "governments." By the ministry of prayer, by the ministry of giving, by the ministry of encouragement, by the s.h.i.+ning face and mute pressure of the hand, and a little word of cheer, and by the countless ways in which we can help, or at least can keep from hindering, we can all find still the footprints of Aquila and Priscilla, if we want to follow them. It is a great grace to be able to rejoice in another's work and pour our lives, like affluent rivers, into great streams. But G.o.d knows whence every drop has come, and in the greater day of recompense many of the helps shall have the chief reward. Beloved, are you helping? Are you helping your pastor, your brother, your husband, your mother, your fellow-worker, and when the harvest comes shall he that soweth and he that reapeth rejoice together?

You can help by holy prayer, Helpful love and joyful song, O, the burdens you may bear, O, the sorrows you may share, O, the crowns you yet may wear, If you help along.

JUNE 22.

"This is that bread which came down from heaven" (John vi. 58).

We had the sentence of death in ourselves that we should not trust in ourselves, but in G.o.d which raiseth the dead; who delivereth us from so great a death, who doth deliver; in whom we trust that He will yet deliver us. This was the supernatural secret of Paul's life; he drew continually in his body from the strength of Christ, his Risen Head. The body which rose from Joseph's tomb was to him a physical reality and the inexhaustible fountain of his vital forces. More than any other he has imparted to us the secret of His strength; "We are members of His body, of His flesh and of His bones"; "The Lord is for the body and the body is for the Lord." Marvelous truth! Divine Elixir of Life and Fountain of Perpetual Youth! Earnest of the Resurrection! Fulfilment of the ancient psalms and songs of faith! "The Lord is the strength of my life, of whom shall I be afraid? My flesh and my heart faint and fail, but G.o.d is the strength of my heart and my portion forever." Beloved, have we learned this secret, and are we living the life of the Incarnate One in our flesh?

JUNE 23.

"Now we are the sons of G.o.d, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be"

(I. John iii. 2).

We are the sons of G.o.d. We are not merely called and even legally declared, but actually are sons of G.o.d by receiving the life and nature of G.o.d; and so we are the very brethren of our Lord; not only in His human nature, but still more in His divine relations.h.i.+p. "Therefore, He is not ashamed to call us brethren." He gives us that which ent.i.tles us to that right, and makes us worthy of it. He does not introduce us into a position for which we are uneducated and unfitted, but He gives us a nature worthy of our glorious standing; and as He shall look upon us in our complete and glorious exaltation reflecting His own likeness and s.h.i.+ning in His Father's glory, He shall have no cause to be ashamed of us. Even now He is pleased to acknowledge us before the universe and call us brethren in the sight of all earth and heaven. Oh, how this dignifies the humblest saint of G.o.d! How little we need mind the misunderstanding of the world if He "is not ashamed to call us brethren."

So let us go out to-day to represent His royal family.

JUNE 24.