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For Those Seeking The Truth
& Dynamic Living Christ is Victor |
January/February 2009
Volume 22, Number 1
“O Lord, Thou Art My God”
"O Lord, thou art my God; I will exalt thee, I will praise thy name; for thou hast done wonderful things; thy counsels of old are faithfulness and truth". (Isaiah 25: 1)
What a wonderful thing it is to have a living God to be our God! Here the prophet says, Thy counsels of old are faithful and truth. We should not forget God's mercies. Oh, we easily forget our difficulties, once they are solved by our God. God touches some people and heals them but soon they forget all about it. No, we should not forget the works of God. Our faith should not rest on feelings. When you are happy your faith is strong. You are not happy when there is a bad telegram in your hand. When every thing goes against you, will you still trust God?
God's words are
dependable. When you get into a ship, can you be sure you will reach the other
shore? When you obey God's words you can be sure about the end result. One of
the most marvellous tunnels made between
There is bitterness at the tail end of all human achievements. But when God says something, it is dependable, true and unalterable. If you obey it, you will reap eternal fruit. Many people know their Bible in their heads. But they do not take it into their hearts. That is not knowing God's word.
"Thy word is true from the beginning: and every one of thy righteous judgements endureth for ever" (Psalm 119: 160). Yes, when you obey it, you will reap eternal fruit. You will be full of courage because you are obeying God’s word. Some people are just leaning on their own feelings. You meet one or two such people in church. Suddenly you see them running about very energetically and then after one month you do not see them at all. Whether they are alive or dead you do not know.
Some letters from friends give you unedifying news. So and so said like this. Why should a mother take the trouble of writing so much of rumours and slanders she has heard? Why should a sister or brother write something unspiritual and unedifying to a brother? As soon as you see that letter, all your joy is gone. Should a little bad news destroy your faith? Does God's word become void because some little calamity has taken place? No, my dear people, learn to evaluate everything by God's word.
In Numbers 23rd
chapter we see a great statement from a man whom the scriptures judged as a
wicked prophet. Balaam was taken by king Balak and
was asked to curse
Dear readers, let us have that faith in God's word. "God has spoken. God has given me this promise. He will not leave me. He will fulfil it." His word is faithful and does not change. Your prosperity may change to poverty in a moment. But God will not change; His counsels are faithfulness. Learn to go by what God says. Do not just go by what your friends say or what your relatives write to you. Go by what God says.
-Joshua Daniel
“Keep Worry Away”
I was in a
hospital in a large town in the
Said the Robin to the Sparrow:
"I should really like to know
Why these anxious human beings
Rush around and worry so.
Said the Sparrow to the Robin:
"Friend, I think that it must be
That they have no heavenly Father
Such as cares for you and me."
Elizabeth Cheney
Aren't you much more valuable to Him than they are? Can anyone of you, however much he worries, make himself an inch taller? And why do you worry about clothes? Consider how the flowers grow. They neither work nor weave, but I tell you that even Solomon in all his glory was never arrayed like one of these. Now, if God so clothes the flowers of the field which are alive today and discarded tomorrow, is He not much more likely to clothe you- you of little faith? Don't worry at all, then, about tomorrow. Tomorrow can take care of itself. One day's trouble is enough for one day.
I could easily understand that her children and her husband were reasons to worry about the future. However, our times are in God's hands, and He loves her family even more than she loved them. Worrying is carrying tomorrow's load with today's strength- carrying two days at once. It is moving into tomorrow ahead of time. Worrying does not empty tomorrow of its sorrow- it empties today of its strength.
"Do you know, Ann, I do not believe that worry is from the Lord. It is from the enemy. There has been a man upon the earth of whom Satan is afraid, a man whom he can neither touch nor resist- Jesus Christ. And that is why we can go to Him for help. You are not able to overcome worry, but the Lord Jesus can, and He will- through His Holy Spirit. When we see that worry is a sin- and that is what it really is, for the Bible tells us not to worry- then we know what to do with sin, don't we?"
“Yes, we take it to the Lord, and when we confess our sins, the blood of Jesus cleanses us from all of our sins.”
"That is true, so just ask forgiveness for having worried, and then ask Jesus to keep worry away. He gives us peace under all circumstances. I have a little stick here that cannot stand on my hand by itself. But I can even let it stand on the top of my finger, if my hand holds it. In the same way, we cannot keep worry away, but when we surrender to the wounded hands of Jesus, He keeps us from falling. One day He will present us blameless and with unspeakable joy. That will be on the day when He will reveal Himself. Jesus is stronger than all of our problems."
I prayed with Ann and then she said, "I have much to think about and I know one thing- I am not able, but Jesus is. He will do the job."
Cast thy burden upon the Lord, and he shall sustain thee: he shall never suffer the righteous to be moved. (Psalms 55:22)
-Corrie Ten Boom
“Reality Check”
“Trust in the LORD, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed.” Psalm 37:3
“Take Them to God”
Don't run away from your troubles. Don't magnify them. Don't dwell on them, taking them to bed with you, spoiling your digestion by feeding upon them all day, and making everybody unhappy by throwing their shadow upon them. But with a resolute, courageous and trustful spirit take them to God in prayer and then go forth to meet and vanquish them, and you will find they are much less formidable than you feared.
An old farmer plowed around a rock in one of his fields for many years. He had grown actually morbid over it, for he had broken a cultivator and two plows besides losing a lot of valuable land in its vicinity. One day he made up his mind that he would dig it out and have done with it. Lo, when he put his crowbar under it he found it was less than a foot thick and that he could loosen it with a trifling effort and carry it away in his wagon. He smiled to think how all through the years it had haunted him.
One day we shall look back on our trials and our anxious cares and find how needless many of them were, so unreal and yet so distressing, that we can say like the old lady when she was reviewing her past life: "I've had so many trials, especially those that never came."
-A. B. Simpson
“God is Our Keeper”
I remember one time my little girl was teasing her mother to get her a muff, and so one day her mother brought a muff home, and although it was storming, she very naturally wanted to go out to try her new muff. So she tried to get me to go out with her. I went out with her, and I said, "Emma, better let me take your hand." She wanted to keep her hands in her muff, and so she refused to take my hand. Well, by and by she came to an icy place, her little feet slipped, and down she went. When I helped her up she said, "Papa, you may give me your little finger." "No, my daughter, just take my hand." "No, no, papa, give me your little finger." Well, I gave my finger to her, and for a little way she got along nicely, but pretty soon we came to another icy place, and again she fell. This time she hurt herself a little, and she said, "Papa, give me your hand," and I gave her my hand, and closed my fingers about her wrist, and held her up so that she could not fall.
Just so God is our keeper. He is wiser than we.
-D. L. Moody
“It Is Not Position But Grace”
Some persons have the foolish notion that the only way in which they can live for God is by becoming ministers, missionaries, or Bible women. Alas! How many would be shut out from any opportunity of magnifying the Most High if this were the case. Beloved, it is not office, it is earnestness; it is not position, it is grace which will enable us to glorify God. God is most surely glorified in that cobbler's stall, where the godly worker, as he plies the awl, sings of the Saviour's love, ay, glorified far more than in many a prebendal stall where official religiousness performs its scanty duties.
The name of Jesus is glorified by the poor unlearned carter as he drives his horse, and blesses his God, or speaks to his fellow labourer by the roadside, as much as by the popular divine who, throughout the country, like Boanerges, is thundering out the gospel. God is glorified by our serving Him in our proper vocations.
Take care, dear reader, that you do not forsake the path of duty by leaving your occupation, and take care you do not dishonour your profession while in it. Think little of yourselves, but do not think too little of your callings. Every lawful trade may be sanctified by the gospel to noblest ends. Turn to the Bible, and you will find the most menial forms of labour connected either with most daring deeds of faith, or with persons whose lives have been illustrious for holiness.
Therefore be not discontented with your calling. Whatever God has made your position, or your work, abide in that, unless you are quite sure that he calls you to something else. Let your first care be to glorify God to the utmost of your power where you are. Fill your present sphere to His praise, and if He needs you in another He will show it you. This evening lay aside vexatious ambition, and embrace peaceful content.
-C. H. Spurgeon
“The Panoply of War”
“… There was no sword in the hand of David.” (I Samuel 17:50)
It is a very strange statement, that too in a battlefield. Nowhere, in any battlefield, was such a statement made. "There was no sword in the hand of David." But Saul tried to equip him with the panoply of war. "There was no sword in the hand of David." But what did he have? God's word, the most potent and invulnerable weapon, was in his mouth.
He was indignant
at the way in which the Philistine Goliath abused the living God. We also must
feel like that. When the heathen defy the living God we must feel aggrieved at
heart. Is there no sword with David? The lion and the bear assaulted him once.
He killed them. The Philistines also seemed to show bestiality. How did David
acquire this faith? Where did it originate? It originated with the Moabite
woman - Ruth. She observed the life of her mother-in-law, Naomi, and when she
was asked to leave Naomi she refused to do so. "I cannot do it. I
will die where you die. Your God will be my God," she said. When she
observed the life of her mother-inlaw even after
the death of her husband and her two sons, she found Naomi filled with faith.
Naomi's faith was strong and her sense of righteousness too and Ruth felt
that in the strange
Then the latter story tells us that Ruth became a mother and Naomi became a grandmother. Her plight at this stage seemed hopeless. However, when there is radiant faith, where there is hopelessness there is hope. The dying embers of hope can be fanned into flame by faith.
When I study the life of Ruth I learn many truths. Ruth begat Obed, Obed begat Jesse and Jesse's son was David. When faith begins in your home it keeps increasing. It had reached higher levels as it went from generation to generation. David attained a great height of faith.
We can surmise that Jesse's home was an ideal home. As the last boy in the house, by the maternal side, this boy David must have learnt lessons in such a home environment. We do not know how our children will learn. How I sat hours on end at meetings burning the midnight oil! My parents, missionaries and other Christians were present. We used to hear the word of God. But I do not know to what extent I understood it. Side by side I had reverence and respect for God. All these things contribute to the richness of our faith. Indubitably they would lead to several desirable behavioural changes in adolescent boys and girls. But one 'sword' was growing in the heart of David and it was a mighty sword indeed.
"To execute vengeance upon the heathen, and punishments upon the people; to bind their kings with chains, and their nobles with fetters of iron; To execute upon them the judgement written: this honour have all his saints. Praise ye the Lord" (Psalm 149:7-9) There are weapons of warfare unseen by men. We are teaching and giving our children war-weapons. The faithful prayers of parents will sharpen these weapons. As a consequence you are binding your neighbours. Your presence becomes an inhibiting presence. There are wicked people around you, full of nefarious activities. They have no fear of God. God keeps such obnoxious people away from our homes. Sometimes when they essay to invade the sanctity of our homes they will be destroyed. The sanctity of a Christian home is its treasure. You must preserve it at all costs.
I know a woman who moved in high circles. She had only one beautiful daughter. She did not want to put her amongst Christian people. She put her with Hindus. She was educated. She was married to a very big man. But she had no weapons. Alas her life was ruined. Her family too could not keep their heads above water. I know her sorrow.
We must support one another. By faith we should build the righteousness of our Christian homes. Some people are very wicked. They bring in wickedness into the church. To do so is to court disaster. We must preserve the sanctity of our Fellowship. You must feel "If I take care of your family, God will take care of my family".
David advances
and kills Goliath, What a witness it was! In the battles of the British, the
righteous man General Montgomery fought. I followed his military strategy. How
he marched into
You must grow in grace. What we receive in our Christian homes, remember, is of very high value. We can never overrate the importance of sanctity. We cannot get it anywhere. When Christian homes decline in faith, no men of faith will arise. A missionary is a man with a sword and the panoply of war.
Let us all be forearmed against the forces of darkness lest we and our homes should succumb to the evil that surrounds us.
-Late Mr. N. Daniel
“Judge Not”
Paul Rader was a
big, strapping football player in his college days. Later on, he ascended
the corporate ladder to head the City Service Oil Company and became an
imposing figure on Wall Street. Then he got saved and obeyed God's call to preach,
taking up the much humbler position of an assistant pastor in
In short, Paul Rader's sacrifice for the service of God was so impressive that nobody could have imagined him entertaining false gods in his life.
One week, a
former missionary was invited to speak in his church. Paul took one look at him
and shook his head. This man seemed a little frail and, strangely enough, was
wearing a flimsy-looking suit of crinkled brown silk. When he rose to speak,
out came a soft, delicate voice that was hardly audible. As he spoke about the
work in
Rader thought to himself, "This missionary is not a man at all!" When the service was over, Rader wasted no time. He confronted the missionary and asked, "Sir, why are you such a sissy? You call yourself a man of God, but look at the way you dress and the way you talk! I don't think you are much of a missionary."
The man calmly
explained, "I was in
The missionary took his handkerchief and dabbed his mouth. Rader's frown betrayed his disgust.
The missionary
continued, "As for my voice ... I did a lot of street preaching in
Rader felt a lump in his throat. Thoroughly embarrassed by his brashness by now, Rader mumbled an apology and beat a hasty retreat. He descended to the church basement, found a pile of coal and fell face down on it. He cried out to God, begging forgiveness for his idiocy and bad judgment. He committed himself to serve the Lord, just as this brother had done.
From that day on, Paul Rader was a man with a missionary heart. With great zeal, he influenced many thousands of young men and women to give themselves for foreign missions.
-Selected
This
newsletter is produced six times per year by the Laymen’s Evangelical
Fellowship International. It is printed and distributed in the
This Fellowship is an inter-denominational missionary and
prayer group working for revival in churches and amongst students in several
countries. We invite every layperson to become God’s ally in changing his
or her corner of the world. We train people in evangelistic work and to be
self-supporting missionaries.
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