New Life

...I will tell you, there is rejoicing in the presence 
of the angels of God over one sinner who repents.
Luke 15:10

We cannot convey the Living Water to another heart
without being watered ourselves on the way. There 
is no joy more exquisite than the joy of leading a 
soul to Christ. Is is like the mother's strange intui-
tive rapture over her newborn baby.

The other day a precious friend passed through the 
gates of Heaven a few minutes after her baby was 
born. Out of her agony she gasped her last words, 
"How is my baby?"

Beloved, do you know the ecstasy of feeling the new 
life of an immortal spirit sweeping through your 
veins, as you kneel by the side of one just born to 
die no more, placed into your Savior?

You may know this joy, and every Christian ought to 
know it a hundredfold. It is the joy of angels, setting 
harps of heaven ringing, and surely it were strange 
if it were not the higher joy of ransomed saints.
A B Simpson

Reader, long ago I was researching the spiritual needs
of patients at an hospital. As I interviewed a number
of people, one or two stand out. There was a woman
in her early twenties who came into the hospital ex-
tremely sick from the treatment of the cancer, not the
cancer itself. Both the family and the patient thought
she was dying from cancer. In a room filled with e-
quipment--the utility room--,  I had the opportunity
to
share the Gospel with her and her response was pure
joy. I told her that the angels were rejoicing. She
looked up and said, "Have a blast!" She walked on air--
and so did I.

Peaceful Stagnation

I came across this quote from AW Tozer:

The cost of quitting will be a life of
   peaceful stagnation.
We sons of eternity just cannot afford
   such a thing.

I have a beautiful friend who is challenged at every
level and yet, and yet, who is persevering and bear-
ing fruit.

Reader, God gives life to us because He has a plan
for every season. Old age may not to be the "golden
years"promised, but God wants us to be fruitful,
"even into old age." I find that to be challenging at
times...but, I am a "daughter of eternity!"

Death Comes

He is dead
I am stunned, incredulous.
A strapping man of 63
There must be some mistake.
A clot to his lung.
Gone without saying goodbye to his wife.
What about eternity?
He was a man of action, a man who lived
   in the visible. He had no need for God, an
   invisible God.

Reader, I am in shock.
A man I texted about eggs has suddenly slipped
    into eternity, unprepared, not ready.
He intimidated me.
I did not speak of what I know.
Why should I go where I was not wanted?
Why indeed...

Bits from Psalm 90
A thousand years in Your sight are like
   Yesterday when it is past
    Like a watch in the night...
In the morning they are like
   Grass which grows up,
In the morning it flourishes
   And grows up,
In the evening it is cut down
   And withers...
We finish our years like a sigh...
The days of our lives--
   Soon cut off, and we
   Fly away...

So teach us to number our
   Days,
That we may gain a heart of 
   Wisdom. 

Death Comes

He is dead
I am stunned, incredulous.
A strapping man of 63
There must be some mistake.
A clot to his lung.
Gone without saying goodbye to his wife.
What about eternity?
He was a man of action, a man who lived
   in the visible. He had no need for God, an
   invisible God.

Reader, I am in shock.
A man I texted about eggs has suddenly slipped
    into eternity, unprepared, not ready.
He intimidated me.
I did not speak of what I know.
Why should I go where I was not wanted?
Why indeed...

Bits from Psalm 90
A thousand years in Your sight are like
   Yesterday when it is past
    Like a watch in the night...
In the morning they are like
   Grass which grows up,
In the morning it flourishes
   And grows up,
In the evening it is cut down
   And withers...
We finish our years like a sigh...
The days of our lives--
   Soon cut off, and we
   Fly away...

So teach us to number our
   Days,
That we may gain a heart of 
   Wisdom. 

Exceeding Great Promises

Whereby are given unto us exceeding great and 
precious promises, that through these ye might
be partakers of the divine nature... 2 Peter 1:4 

We cannot too highly value and appreciate heart 
hunger for the Word. It is the Spirit of Truth. We 
may have been born again without knowing much 
of the Bible, but we certainly are not going to grow 
to any extent apart from a careful and persistent 
study of the Word of God. Yes, the maturing believer 
is a Spirit-dependent student of the scriptures.

Christian progress is not a question of attainting to
some abstract standard, or of pressing through to a 
far-off goal. It is wholly a question of seeing God's 
standard in God's Word. You advance spiritually by 
finding out what you really are (in Christ), not by 
trying to become what you hope to be. That goal 
you will never reach, however earnestly you may 
strive.

It is when you see you are dead unto sin that you 
die to it (daily); it is when you see you are risen that
you arise; it is when you see you are a new creature 
in Him that you (progressively) grow. Seeing the ac-
complished fact in the Word determines the pathway 
to the realizing of that fact. The end is reached by 
seeing, not by desiring or working. The only possi-
bility of spiritual progress lies in our discovering the 
truth as God sees it; the truth concerning Christ, the 
truth concerning ourselves in Christ. Watchman Nee

Reader, I continually come back to the truth that I
am IN Christ. There are far more scriptures depicting
what we have IN Christ than scriptures which speak
of His being in us. It was not until I began to under-
stand this that I began to grow in hope and faith.

The Joyful Sound

Blessed is the people that know the joyful sound: they
shall walk, O Lord, in the light of thy countenance.
Psalm 89:15

The joyful sound!

Souls that are called by the sound of the gospel--how 
joyful does it render them. The trumpets of the Gospel 
do to the soul as the harps of David did to Saul--they 
drive away the evil spirit of sorrow, sadness, and des-
pair.

Rejoice, Christian! God the Father is your Friend; God 
the Son is your guarantee for good; God the Spirt is
your Guide and comforter--be of good cheer, your sins
are forgiven!

Consider also: The angels are your guardians, you are
the temple of God. God will make all things work to-
wether for your good. These are the spiritual blessings
reserved for the believer. Joyful sound! How reviving!
How ravishing  Cotton Mather

If you have no joy in your religion, there's a leak in
your Christianity somewhere. Billy Sunday

Reader, have you heard the joyful sound????

Can He Rescue You?

Daniel, servant of the living God, has your God whom you 
serve continually, been able to rescue you?  Daniel 6:20

We find the expression "the living God" many times in the Scrip-
tures, and yet it is the very thing we are so prone to forget. We 
know it is written "the living God," but in our daily life there is 
almost nothing we lose sight of as often as the fact that God is 
the living God. We forget that His is now exactly what He was 
three or four thousand years ago, that He has the same sovereign 
power, and that He extends the same gracious love toward those 
who love and serve Him. 

Be assured, if you walk with Him, look to Him, and expect help 
from Him, He will never fail you. As an older believer who has 
known the Lord for 44 years wrote: "God has never failed me. 
Even in my greatest difficulties, heaviest trials, and deepest po-
verty and need, He has never failed me. Because I was enabled 
by God's grace to trust Him, He has always come to my aid. I de-
light in speaking well of His name.
George Mueller

Reader, who else can say that they have a "living God?" None of
the other religions can point to a resurrected god, who continues
to live. Our Jesus is unique and above all other gods!
Billy Graham went home to be with Jesus after 99 years here on
earth. Only a moment really. But, he will spent eternity with his
family and friends in a place he already loved--heaven. His God
was/is a living God. I am so encouraged today by this fact: He is
a living God to me!

Teach us to number our days,
That we may gain a heart of
   wisdom. Ps 90:12

And let the beauty of the 
   Lord our God be upon us,
And establish the work of our
   hands for us;
Yes, establish the work of our
   hands. Ps 90:17