Bible Heaven/Bible Heaven.iso/online/topics27/t28650

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28651
 June 16                                                  Morning

 \\"And I give unto them eternal life, and they shall never\\
 \\perish."\\
                                                     --John 10:28

    The Christian should never think or speak lightly of
 unbelief. For a child of God to mistrust his love, his truth,
 his faithfulness, must be greatly displeasing to him. How can we
 ever grieve him by doubting his upholding grace? Christian! it
 is contrary to every promise of God's precious Word that thou
 shouldst ever be forgotten or left to perish. If it could be so,
 how could he be true who has said, "Can a woman forget her
 sucking child, that she should not have compassion on the son of
 her womb? Yea, they may forget, yet will I never forget thee."
 What were the value of that promise--"The mountains shall
 depart, and the hills be removed; but my kindness shall not
 depart from thee, neither shall the covenant of my peace be
 removed, saith the Lord that hath mercy on thee." Where were the
 truth of Christ's words--"I give unto my sheep eternal life; and
 they shall never perish, neither shall any man pluck them out of
 my hand. My Father, which gave them me, is greater than all; and
 no man is able to pluck them out of my Father's hand." Where
 were the doctrines of grace? They would be all disproved if one
 child of God should perish. Where were the veracity of God, his
 honour, his power, his grace, his covenant, his oath, if any of
 those for whom Christ has died, and who have put their trust in
 him, should nevertheless be cast away? Banish those unbelieving
 fears which so dishonour God. Arise, shake thyself from the
 dust, and put on thy beautiful garments. Remember it is sinful
 to doubt his Word wherein he has promised thee that thou shalt
 never perish. Let the eternal life within thee express itself in
 confident rejoicing.

               "The gospel bears my spirit up:
               A faithful and unchanging God
               Lays the foundation for my hope,
               In oaths, and promises, and blood."

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28751
 # Job 5:1 - 8:22 * Daily Bible Reading
28652
 June 17                                                  Morning

 \\"Help, Lord."\\
                                                     --Psalm 12:1

    \\The prayer itself is remarkable\\, for it is \\short\\, but
 \\seasonable, sententious\\, and \\suggestive\\. David mourned
 the fewness of faithful men, and therefore lifted up his heart
 in supplication--when the creature failed, he flew to the
 Creator. He evidently felt his own weakness, or he would not
 have cried for help; but at the same time he intended honestly
 to exert himself for the cause of truth, for the word "help" is
 inapplicable where we ourselves do nothing. There is much of
 \\directness, clearness of perception\\, and \\distinctness of\\
 \\utterance\\ in this petition of two words; much more, indeed,
 than in the long rambling outpourings of certain professors. The
 Psalmist runs straight-forward to his God, with a
 well-considered prayer; he knows what he is seeking, and where
 to seek it. Lord, teach us to pray in the same blessed manner.

    \\The occasions for the use of this prayer are frequent\\. In
 providential afflictions how suitable it is for tried believers
 who find all helpers failing them. Students, in \\doctrinal\\
 \\difficulties\\, may often obtain aid by lifting up this cry of
 "Help, Lord," to the Holy Spirit, the great Teacher. Spiritual
 warriors in \\inward conflicts\\ may send to the throne for
 reinforcements, and this will be a model for their request.
 Workers in \\heavenly labour\\ may thus obtain grace in time of
 need. Seeking sinners, in \\doubts and alarms\\, may offer up
 the same weighty supplication; in fact, in all these cases,
 times, and places, this will serve the turn of needy souls.
 "Help, Lord," will suit us living and dying, suffering or
 labouring, rejoicing or sorrowing. In him our help is found, let
 us not be slack to cry to him.

    \\The answer to the prayer is certain\\, if it be sincerely
 offered through Jesus. The Lord's character assures us that he
 will not leave his people; his relationship as Father and
 Husband guarantee us his aid; his gift of Jesus is a pledge of
 every good thing; and his sure promise stands, "Fear not, I WILL
 HELP THEE."

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28752
 # Job 9:1 - 12:25 * Daily Bible Reading
28653
 June 18                                                  Morning

 \\"Thy Redeemer."\\
                                                    --Isaiah 54:5

    Jesus, the Redeemer, is altogether ours and ours for ever.
 All the \\offices\\ of Christ are held on our behalf. He is king
 for us, priest for us, and prophet for us. Whenever we read a
 new title of the Redeemer, let us appropriate him as ours under
 that name as much as under any other. The shepherd's staff, the
 father's rod, the captain's sword, the priest's mitre, the
 prince's sceptre, the prophet's mantle, all are ours. Jesus hath
 no dignity which he will not employ for our exaltation, and no
 prerogative which he will not exercise for our defence. His
 fulness of \\Godhead\\ is our unfailing, inexhaustible
 treasure-house.

    His \\manhood\\ also, which he took upon him for us, is ours
 in all its perfection. To us our gracious Lord communicates the
 spotless virtue of a stainless character; to us he gives the
 meritorious efficacy of a devoted life; on us he bestows the
 reward procured by obedient submission and incessant service. He
 makes the unsullied garment of his life our covering beauty; the
 glittering virtues of his character our ornaments and jewels;
 and the superhuman meekness of his death our boast and glory. He
 bequeaths us his manger, from which to learn how God came down
 to man; and his Cross to teach us how man may go up to God. All
 his thoughts, emotions, actions, utterances, miracles, and
 intercessions, were for us. He trod the road of sorrow on our
 behalf, and hath made over to us as his heavenly legacy the full
 results of all the labours of his life. He is now as much ours
 as heretofore; and he blushes not to acknowledge himself
 "\\our\\ Lord Jesus Christ," though he is the blessed and only
 Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords. Christ
 everywhere and every way is our Christ, for ever and ever most
 richly to enjoy. O my soul, by the power of the Holy Spirit!
 call him this morning, "thy Redeemer."

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28753
 # Job 13:1 - 16:22 * Daily Bible Reading
28654
 June 19                                                  Morning

 \\"And they were all filled with the Holy Ghost."\\
                                                       --Acts 2:4

    Rich were the blessings of this day if all of us were filled
 with the Holy Ghost. The consequences of this sacred filling of
 the soul it would be impossible to overestimate. Life, comfort,
 light, purity, power, peace; and many other precious blessings
 are inseparable from the Spirit's benign presence. As sacred
 \\oil\\, he anoints the head of the believer, sets him apart to
 the priesthood of saints, and gives him grace to execute his
 office aright. As the only truly purifying \\water\\ he cleanses
 us from the power of sin and sanctifies us unto holiness,
 working in us to will and to do of the Lord's good pleasure. As
 the \\light\\, he manifested to us at first our lost estate, and
 now he reveals the Lord Jesus to us and in us, and guides us in
 the way of righteousness. Enlightened by his pure celestial ray,
 we are no more darkness but light in the Lord. \\As fire\\, he
 both purges us from dross, and sets our consecrated nature on a
 blaze. He is the sacrificial flame by which we are enabled to
 offer our whole souls as a living sacrifice unto God. As
 heavenly \\dew\\, he removes our barrenness and fertilizes our
 lives. O that he would drop from above upon us at this early
 hour! Such morning dew would be a sweet commencement for the
 day. As the \\dove\\, with wings of peaceful love he broods over
 his Church and over the souls of believers, and as a Comforter
 he dispels the cares and doubts which mar the peace of his
 beloved. He descends upon the chosen as upon the Lord in Jordan,
 and bears witness to their sonship by working in them a filial
 spirit by which they cry Abba, Father. As the \\wind\\, he
 brings the breath of life to men; blowing where he listeth he
 performs the quickening operations by which the spiritual
 creation is animated and sustained. Would to God, that we might
 feel his presence this day and every day.

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28754
 # Job 17:1 - 20:29 * Daily Bible Reading
28655
 June 20                                                  Morning

 \\"For, lo, I will command, and I will sift the house of Israel\\
 \\among all nations, like as corn is sifted in a sieve, yet\\
 \\shall not the least grain fall upon the earth."\\
                                                       --Amos 9:9

    Every sifting comes by \\divine command and permission\\.
 Satan must ask leave before he can lay a finger upon Job. Nay,
 more, in some sense our siftings are \\directly the work of\\
 \\heaven\\, for the text says, "I will sift the house of
 Israel." Satan, like a drudge, may hold the sieve, hoping to
 destroy the corn; but the overruling hand of the Master is
 accomplishing the purity of the grain by the very process which
 the enemy intended to be destructive. Precious, but much sifted
 corn of the Lord's floor, be comforted by the blessed fact that
 the Lord directeth both flail and sieve to his own glory, and to
 thine eternal profit.

    The Lord Jesus will surely use the fan which is in his hand,
 and will \\divide the precious from the vile\\. All are not Israel
 that are of Israel; the heap on the barn floor is not clean
 provender, and hence the winnowing process must be performed. In
 the sieve true weight alone has power. Husks and chaff being
 devoid of substance must fly before the wind, and only solid
 corn will remain.

    Observe the \\complete safety of the Lord's wheat\\; even the
 least grain has a promise of preservation. God himself sifts,
 and therefore it is stern and terrible work; he sifts them in
 all places, "among all nations"; he sifts them in the most
 effectual manner, "like as corn is sifted in a sieve"; and yet
 for all this, not the smallest, lightest, or most shrivelled
 grain, is permitted to fall to the ground. Every individual
 believer is precious in the sight of the Lord, a shepherd would
 not lose one sheep, nor a jeweller one diamond, nor a mother one
 child, nor a man one limb of his body, nor will the Lord lose
 one of his redeemed people. However little we may be, if we are
 the Lord's, we may rejoice that we are preserved in Christ
 Jesus.

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28755
 # Job 21:1 - 24:25 * Daily Bible Reading
28656
 June 21                                                  Morning

 \\"Thou art fairer than the children of men."\\
                                                     --Psalm 45:2

    The entire person of Jesus is but as one gem, and his life is
 all along but one impression of the seal. He is altogether
 complete; not only in his several parts, but as a gracious
 all-glorious whole. His character is not a mass of fair colours
 mixed confusedly, nor a heap of precious stones laid carelessly
 one upon another; he is a picture of beauty and a breastplate of
 glory. In him, all the "things of good repute" are in their
 proper places, and assist in adorning each other. Not one
 feature in his glorious person attracts attention at the expense
 of others; but he is perfectly and altogether lovely.

    Oh, Jesus! thy power, thy grace, thy justice, thy tenderness,
 thy truth, thy majesty, and thine immutability make up such a
 man, or rather such a God-man, as neither heaven nor earth hath
 seen elsewhere. Thy infancy, thy eternity, thy sufferings, thy
 triumphs, thy death, and thine immortality, are all woven in one
 gorgeous tapestry, without seam or rent. Thou art music without
 discord; thou art many, and yet not divided; thou art all
 things, and yet not diverse. As all the colours blend into one
 resplendent rainbow, so all the glories of heaven and earth meet
 in thee, and unite so wondrously, that there is none like thee
 in all things; nay, if all the virtues of the most excellent
 were bound in one bundle, they could not rival thee, thou mirror
 of all perfection. Thou hast been anointed with the holy oil of
 myrrh and cassia, which thy God hath reserved for thee alone;
 and as for thy fragrance, it is as the holy perfume, the like of
 which none other can ever mingle, even with the art of the
 apothecary; each spice is fragrant, but the compound is divine.

         "Oh, sacred symmetry! oh, rare connection
         Of many perfects, to make one perfection!
         Oh, heavenly music, where all parts do meet
         In one sweet strain, to make one perfect sweet!"

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28756
 # Job 25:1 - 29:25 * Daily Bible Reading
28657
 June 22                                                  Morning

 \\"He shall build the temple of the Lord; and he shall bear the\\
 \\glory."\\
                                                 --Zechariah 6:13

    Christ himself is the builder of his spiritual temple, and he
 has built it on the mountains of his unchangeable affection, his
 omnipotent grace, and his infallible truthfulness. But as it was
 in Solomon's temple, so in this; the materials need making
 ready. There are the "Cedars of Lebanon," but they are not
 framed for the building; they are not cut down, and shaped, and
 made into those planks of cedar, whose odoriferous beauty shall
 make glad the courts of the Lord's house in Paradise. There are
 also the rough stones still in the quarry, they must be hewn
 thence, and squared. All this is Christ's own work. Each
 individual believer is being prepared, and polished, and made
 ready for his place in the temple; but Christ's own hand
 performs the preparation-work. Afflictions cannot sanctify,
 excepting as they are used by him to this end. Our prayers and
 efforts cannot make us ready for heaven, apart from the hand of
 Jesus, who fashioneth our hearts aright.

    As in the building of Solomon's temple, "there was neither
 hammer, nor axe, nor any tool of iron, heard in the house,"
 because all was brought perfectly ready for the exact spot it
 was to occupy--so is it with the temple which Jesus builds; the
 making ready is all done on earth. When we reach heaven, there
 will be no sanctifying us there, no squaring us with affliction,
 no planing us with suffering. No, we must be made meet
 here--all \\that\\ Christ will do beforehand; and when he has done
 it, we shall be ferried by a loving hand across the stream of
 death, and brought to the heavenly Jerusalem, to abide as
 eternal pillars in the temple of our Lord.

                    "Beneath his eye and care,
                    The edifice shall rise,
                    Majestic, strong, and fair,
                    And shine above the skies."

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28757
 # Job 30:1 - 33:33 * Daily Bible Reading
28658
 June 23                                                  Morning

 \\"Ephraim is a cake not turned."\\
                                                      --Hosea 7:8

    A cake not turned is \\uncooked on one side\\; and so Ephraim
 was, in many respects, untouched by divine grace: though there
 was some partial obedience, there was very much rebellion left.
 My soul, I charge thee, see whether this be thy case. Art thou
 thorough in the things of God? Has grace gone through the very
 centre of thy being so as to be felt in its divine operations in
 all thy powers, thy actions, thy words, and thy thoughts? To be
 sanctified, spirit, soul, and body, should be thine aim and
 prayer; and although sanctification may not be perfect in thee
 anywhere in degree, yet it must be universal in its action;
 there must not be the appearance of holiness in one place and
 reigning sin in another, else thou, too, wilt be a cake not
 turned.

    A cake not turned is \\soon burnt on the side nearest the\\
 \\fire\\, and although no man can have too much religion, there
 are some who seem burnt black with bigoted zeal for that part of
 truth which they have received, or are charred to a cinder with
 a vainglorious Pharisaic ostentation of those religious
 performances which suit their humour. The assumed appearance of
 superior sanctity frequently accompanies a total absence of all
 vital godliness. The saint in public is a devil in private. He
 deals in flour by day and in soot by night. The cake which is
 burned on one side, is dough on the other.

    \\If it be so with me, O Lord, turn me\\! Turn my
 unsanctified nature to the fire of thy love and let it feel the
 sacred glow, and let my burnt side cool a little while I learn
 my own weakness and want of heat when I am removed from thy
 heavenly flame. Let me not be found a double-minded man, but one
 entirely under the powerful influence of reigning grace; for
 well I know if I am left like a cake unturned, and am not on
 both sides the subject of thy grace, I must be consumed for ever
 amid everlasting burnings.

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28758
 # Job 34:1 - 37:24 * Daily Bible Reading
28659
 June 24                                                  Morning

 \\"A certain woman of the company lifted up her voice, and said\\
 \\unto him, Blessed is the womb that bare thee, and the paps\\
 \\which thou hast sucked. But he said, Yea rather, blessed are\\
 \\they that hear the word of God, and keep it."\\
                                                 --Luke 11:27,28

    It is fondly imagined by some that it must have involved very
 special privileges to have been the mother of our Lord, because
 they supposed that she had the benefit of looking into his very
 heart in a way in which we cannot hope to do. There may be an
 appearance of plausibility in the supposition, but not much. We
 do not know that Mary knew more than others; what she did know
 she did well to lay up in her heart; but she does not appear
 from anything we read in the Evangelists to have been a
 better-instructed believer than any other of Christ's disciples.
 All that she knew we also may discover. Do you wonder that we
 should say so? Here is a text to prove it: "The secret of the
 Lord is with them that fear him, and he will show them his
 covenant." Remember the Master's words--"Henceforth I call you
 not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his Lord doeth:
 but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard
 of my Father I have made known unto you." So blessedly does this
 Divine Revealer of secrets tell us his heart, that he keepeth
 back nothing which is profitable to us; his own assurance is,
 "If it were not so, I would have told you." Doth he not this day
 manifest himself unto us as he doth not unto the world? It is
 even so; and therefore we will not ignorantly cry out, "Blessed
 is the womb that bare thee," but we will intelligently bless God
 that, having heard the Word and kept it, we have first of all as
 true a communion with the Saviour as the Virgin had, and in the
 second place as true an acquaintance with the secrets of his
 heart as she can be supposed to have obtained. Happy soul to be
 thus privileged!

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28759
 # Job 38:1 - 40:24 * Daily Bible Reading
28660
 June 25                                                  Morning

 \\"Get thee up into the high mountain."\\
                                                    --Isaiah 40:9

    Our knowledge of Christ is somewhat like climbing one of our
 Welsh mountains. When you are at the base you see but little:
 the mountain itself appears to be but one-half as high as it
 really is. Confined in a little valley, you discover scarcely
 anything but the rippling brooks as they descend into the stream
 at the foot of the mountain. Climb the first rising knoll, and
 the valley lengthens and widens beneath your feet. Go higher,
 and you see the country for four or five miles round, and you
 are delighted with the widening prospect. Mount still, and the
 scene enlarges; till at last, when you are on the summit, and
 look east, west, north, and south, you see almost all England
 lying before you. Yonder is a forest in some distant county,
 perhaps two hundred miles away, and here the sea, and there a
 shining river and the smoking chimneys of a manufacturing town,
 or the masts of the ships in a busy port. All these things
 please and delight you, and you say, "I could not have imagined
 that so much could be seen at this elevation." Now, the
 Christian life is of the same order. When we first believe in
 Christ we see but little of him. The higher we climb the more we
 discover of his beauties. But who has ever gained the summit?
 Who has known all the heights and depths of the love of Christ
 which passes knowledge? Paul, when grown old, sitting
 grey-haired, shivering in a dungeon in Rome, could say with
 greater emphasis than we can, "I know whom I have believed," for
 each experience had been like the climbing of a hill, each trial
 had been like ascending another summit, and his death seemed
 like gaining the top of the mountain, from which he could see
 the whole of the faithfulness and the love of him to whom he had
 committed his soul. Get thee up, dear friend, into the high
 mountain.

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28760
 # Job 41:1 - 42:17 * Daily Bible Reading
28661
 June 26                                                  Morning

 \\"Art thou become like unto us?"\\
                                                   --Isaiah 14:10

    What must be the apostate professor's doom when his naked
 soul appears before God? How will he bear that voice, "Depart,
 ye cursed; thou hast rejected me, and I reject thee; thou hast
 played the harlot, and departed from me: I also have banished
 thee for ever from my presence, and will not have mercy upon
 thee." What will be this wretch's shame at the last great day
 when, before assembled multitudes, the apostate shall be
 unmasked? See the profane, and sinners who never professed
 religion, lifting themselves up from their beds of fire to point
 at him. "There he is," says one, "will he preach the gospel in
 hell?" "There he is," says another, "he rebuked me for cursing,
 and was a hypocrite himself!" "Aha!" says another, "here comes a
 psalm-singing Methodist--one who was always at his meeting; he
 is the man who boasted of his being sure of everlasting life;
 and here he is!" No greater eagerness will ever be seen among
 Satanic tormentors, than in that day when devils drag the
 hypocrite's soul down to perdition. Bunyan pictures this with
 massive but awful grandeur of poetry when he speaks of the
 back-way to hell. Seven devils bound the wretch with nine cords,
 and dragged him from the road to heaven, in which he had
 professed to walk, and thrust him through the back-door into
 hell. Mind that back-way to hell, professors! "Examine
 yourselves, whether ye be in the faith." Look well to your
 state; see whether you be in Christ or not. It is the easiest
 thing in the world to give a lenient verdict when oneself is to
 be tried; but O, be just and true here. Be just to all, but be
 rigorous to yourself. Remember if it be not a rock on which you
 build, when the house shall fall, great will be the fall of it.
 O may the Lord give you sincerity, constancy, and firmness; and
 in no day, however evil, may you be led to turn aside.

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28761
 # Ps 1:1 - 9:20 * Daily Bible Reading
28662
 June 27                                                  Morning

 \\"Only ye shall not go very far away."\\
                                                    --Exodus 8:28

    This is a crafty word from the lip of the arch-tyrant
 Pharaoh. If the poor bondaged Israelites must needs go out of
 Egypt, then he bargains with them that it shall not be very far
 away; not too far for them to escape the terror of his arms, and
 the observation of his spies. After the same fashion, the world
 loves not the non-conformity of nonconformity, or the dissidence
 of dissent; it would have us be more charitable and not carry
 matters with too severe a hand. Death to the world, and burial
 with Christ, are experiences which carnal minds treat with
 ridicule, and hence the ordinance which sets them forth is
 almost universally neglected, and even contemned. Worldly wisdom
 recommends the path of compromise, and talks of "moderation."
 According to this carnal policy, purity is admitted to be very
 desirable, but we are warned against being too precise; truth is
 of course to be followed, but error is not to be severely
 denounced. "Yes," says the world, "be spiritually minded by all
 means, but do not deny yourself a little gay society, an
 occasional ball, and a Christmas visit to a theatre. What's the
 good of crying down a thing when it is so fashionable, and
 everybody does it?" Multitudes of professors yield to this
 cunning advice, to their own eternal ruin. If we would follow
 the Lord wholly, we must go right away into the wilderness of
 separation, and leave the Egypt of the carnal world behind us.
 We must leave its maxims, its pleasures, and its religion too,
 and go far away to the place where the Lord calls his sanctified
 ones. When the town is on fire, our house cannot be too far from
 the flames. When the plague is abroad, a man cannot be too far
 from its haunts. The further from a viper the better, and the
 further from worldly conformity the better. To all true
 believers let the trumpet-call be sounded, "Come ye out from
 among them, be ye separate."

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28762
 # Ps 10:1 - 17:15 * Daily Bible Reading
28663
 June 28                                                  Morning

 \\"Looking unto Jesus."\\
                                                   --Hebrews 12:2

    It is ever the Holy Spirit's work to turn our eyes away from
 self to Jesus; but Satan's work is just the opposite of this,
 for he is constantly trying to make us regard ourselves instead
 of Christ. He insinuates, "Your sins are too great for pardon;
 you have no faith; you do not repent enough; you will never be
 able to continue to the end; you have not the joy of his
 children; you have such a wavering hold of Jesus." All these are
 thoughts about self, and we shall never find comfort or
 assurance by looking within. But the Holy Spirit turns our eyes
 entirely away from self: he tells us that we are nothing, but
 that "Christ is all in all." Remember, therefore, it is not
 \\thy hold\\ of Christ that saves thee--it is Christ; it is not
 \\thy joy\\ in Christ that saves thee--it is Christ; it is not
 even faith in Christ, though that be the instrument--it is
 Christ's blood and merits; therefore, look not so much to thy
 hand with which thou art grasping Christ, as to Christ; look not
 to thy hope, but to Jesus, the source of thy hope; look not to
 thy faith, but to Jesus, the author and finisher of thy faith.
 We shall never find happiness by looking at our prayers, our
 doings, or our feelings; it is what \\Jesus\\ is, not what we
 are, that gives rest to the soul. If we would at once overcome
 Satan and have peace with God, it must be by "looking unto
 Jesus." Keep thine eye simply on him; let his death, his
 sufferings, his merits, his glories, his intercession, be fresh
 upon thy mind; when thou wakest in the morning look to him; when
 thou liest down at night look to him. Oh! let not thy hopes or
 fears come between thee and Jesus; follow hard after him, and he
 will never fail thee.

               "My hope is built on nothing less
               Than Jesus' blood and righteousness:
               I dare not trust the sweetest frame,
               But wholly lean on Jesus' name."

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28763
 # Ps 18:1 - 22:31 * Daily Bible Reading
28664
 June 29                                                  Morning

 \\"Them also which sleep in Jesus will God bring with him."\\
                                           --1 Thessalonians 4:14

    Let us not imagine that \\the soul\\ sleeps in insensibility.
 "Today shalt thou be with me in paradise," is the whisper of
 Christ to every dying saint. They "sleep in Jesus," but their
 souls are before the throne of God, praising him day and night
 in his temple, singing hallelujahs to him who washed them from
 their sins in his blood. The body sleeps in its lonely bed of
 earth, beneath the coverlet of grass. But what is this sleep?
 The idea connected with sleep is "\\rest\\," and that is the
 thought which the Spirit of God would convey to us. Sleep makes
 each night a Sabbath for the day. Sleep shuts fast the door of
 the soul, and bids all intruders tarry for a while, that the
 life within may enter its summer garden of ease. The toil-worn
 believer quietly sleeps, as does the weary child when it
 slumbers on its mother's breast. Oh! happy they who die in the
 Lord; they rest from their labours, and their works do follow
 them. Their quiet repose shall never be broken until God shall
 rouse them to give them their full reward. Guarded by angel
 watchers, curtained by eternal mysteries, they sleep on, the
 inheritors of glory, till the fulness of time shall bring the
 fulness of redemption. What an awaking shall be theirs! They
 were laid in their last resting place, weary and worn, but such
 they shall not rise. They went to their rest with the furrowed
 brow, and the wasted features, but they wake up in beauty and
 glory. The shrivelled seed, so destitute of form and comeliness,
 rises from the dust a beauteous flower. The winter of the grave
 gives way to the spring of redemption and the summer of glory.
 Blessed is death, since it, through the divine power, disrobes
 us of this work-day garment, to clothe us with the wedding
 garment of incorruption. Blessed are those who "sleep in Jesus."

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28764
 # Ps 23:1 - 30:12 * Daily Bible Reading
28665
 June 30                                                  Morning

 \\"And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them."\\
                                                     --John 17:22

    Behold the superlative liberality of the Lord Jesus, for he
 hath given us his all. Although a tithe of his possessions would
 have made a universe of angels rich beyond all thought, yet was
 he not content until he had given us all that he had. It would
 have been surprising grace if he had allowed us to eat the
 crumbs of his bounty beneath the table of his mercy; but he will
 do nothing by halves, he makes us sit with him and share the
 feast. Had he given us some small pension from his royal
 coffers, we should have had cause to love him eternally; but no,
 he will have his bride as rich as himself, and he will not have
 a glory or a grace in which she shall not share. He has not been
 content with less than making us joint-heirs with himself, so
 that we might have equal possessions. He has emptied all his
 estate into the coffers of the Church, and hath all things
 common with his redeemed. There is not one room in his house the
 key of which he will withhold from his people. He gives them
 full liberty to take all that he hath to be their own; he loves
 them to make free with his treasure, and appropriate as much as
 they can possibly carry. The boundless fulness of his
 all-sufficiency is as free to the believer as the air he
 breathes. Christ hath put the flagon of his love and grace to
 the believer's lip, and bidden him drink on for ever; for could
 he drain it, he is welcome to do so, and as he cannot exhaust
 it, he is bidden to drink abundantly, for it is all his own.
 What truer proof of fellowship can heaven or earth afford?

                 "When I stand before the throne
                 Dressed in beauty not my own;
                 When I see thee as thou art,
                 Love thee with unsinning heart;
                 Then, Lord, shall I fully know--
                 Not till then--how much I owe."

 Evening Reading .......................................... 28765
 # Ps 31:1 - 35:28 * Daily Bible Reading
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