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\ / Charles Spurgeon's MORNING & EVENING
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Wednesday, July 9, 2008
MORNING:
"Forget not all His benefits."
-- Psalms 103:2
It is a delightful and profitable occupation to mark the hand of God in
the lives of ancient saints, and to observe his goodness in delivering
them, his mercy in pardoning them, and his faithfulness in keeping his
covenant with them. But would it not be even more interesting and
profitable for us to remark the hand of God in our own lives? Ought we
not to look upon our own history as being at least as full of God, as
full of his goodness and of his truth, as much a proof of his
faithfulness and veracity, as the lives of any of the saints who have
gone before? We do our Lord an injustice when we suppose that he
wrought all his mighty acts, and showed himself strong for those in the
early time, but doth not perform wonders or lay bare his arm for the
saints who are now upon the earth. Let us review our own lives. Surely
in these we may discover some happy incidents, refreshing to ourselves
and glorifying to our God. Have you had no deliverances? Have you
passed through no rivers, supported by the divine presence? Have you
walked through no fires unharmed? Have you had no manifestations? Have
you had no choice favours? The God who gave Solomon the desire of his
heart, hath he never listened to you and answered your requests? That
God of lavish bounty of whom David sang, "Who satisfieth thy mouth with
good things," hath he never satiated you with fatness? Have you never
been made to lie down in green pastures? Have you never been led by the
still waters? Surely the goodness of God has been the same to us as to
the saints of old. Let us, then, weave his mercies into a song. Let us
take the pure gold of thankfulness, and the jewels of praise and make
them into another crown for the head of Jesus. Let our souls give forth
music as sweet and as exhilarating as came from David's harp, while we
praise the Lord whose mercy endureth for ever.
EVENING:
"And God divided the light from the darkness."
-- Genesis 1:4
A believer has two principles at work within him. In his natural estate
he was subject to one principle only, which was darkness; now light has
entered, and the two principles disagree. Mark the apostle Paul's words
in the seventh chapter of Romans: "I find then a law, that, when I
would do good, evil is present with me. For I delight in the law of God
after the inward man: but I see another law in my members, warring
against the law of my mind, and bringing me into captivity to the law
of sin, which is in my members." How is this state of things
occasioned? "The Lord divided the light from the darkness." Darkness,
by itself, is quiet and undisturbed, but when the Lord sends in light,
there is a conflict, for the one is in opposition to the other: a
conflict which will never cease till the believer is altogether light
in the Lord. If there be a division within the individual Christian,
there is certain to be a division without. So soon as the Lord gives to
any man light, he proceeds to separate himself from the darkness
around; he secedes from a merely worldly religion of outward
ceremonial, for nothing short of the gospel of Christ will now satisfy
him, and he withdraws himself from worldly society and frivolous
amusements, and seeks the company of the saints, for "We know we have
passed from death unto life, because we love the brethren." The light
gathers to itself, and the darkness to itself. What God has divided,
let us never try to unite, but as Christ went without the camp, bearing
his reproach, so let us come out from the ungodly, and be a peculiar
people. He was holy, harmless, undefiled, separate from sinners; and,
as he was, so we are to be nonconformists to the world, dissenting from
all sin, and distinguished from the rest of mankind by our likeness to
our Master.
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MORNING & EVENING from HEARTLIGHT /\/\
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Morning & Evening is the classic devotional by 19th-century writer
and preacher Charles Spurgeon. It's part of HEARTLIGHT Magazine,
the leading Christian living e-zine on the Web. Visit HEARTLIGHT
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