Different

#1756

²⁶ For ye see your calling, brethren, how that not many wise men after the flesh, not many mighty, not many noble, are called:

²⁷ But God hath chosen the foolish things of the world to confound the wise; and God hath chosen the weak things of the world to confound the things which are mighty;

²⁸ And base things of the world, and things which are despised, hath God chosen, yea, and things which are not, to bring to nought things that are:

²⁹ That no flesh should glory in his presence.

³⁰ But of him are ye in Christ Jesus, who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption:

³¹ That, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord. (1 Corinthians Chapter 1)

Today's Puritan Audio Devotional:

Thomas Watson's choice excerpts on Scripture
Play Audio! Download Audio

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We soon grow dull, cold, lifeless, and inactive!

(James Smith, "The Great Comforter" 1858)

"It is the Spirit who quickens; the flesh profits nothing." John 6:63

All real religion begins with the quickening of the Spirit. When we experience this . . .
  we begin to breathe after spiritual things; 
  we open our eyes in a new world; 
  we hunger and thirst after righteousness; 
  and at length taste that the Lord is gracious. 
We then have . . .
  new thoughts, 
  new desires, 
  new hopes, 
  new fears, 
  new joys, and 
  new sorrows. 
The eye fixes on Christ, 
the heart goes out to Christ, and 
the chief desire of the soul is to be like Christ. 

The Spirit not only quickens us at first--but all through life we need and are dependent on the Spirit's quickening. He quickens us to pray, and He quickens us in prayer. It is His quickening which puts . . .
  life into our graces,
  energy into our prayers,
  confidence into our expectations, and
  enables us to resist Satan, steadfast in the faith.

If His quickening power is withheld--we soon grow dull, cold, lifeless, and inactive! We have . . .
  no power in prayer,
  no enjoyment in ordinances,
  no liberty in speaking to the saints,
  nor profit in reading God's Word. 
Every duty becomes a task, 
every privilege becomes a burden, and 
every cross appears insupportable!

While under the quickening operation of the Spirit--we can do all things; but without His quickening--we can do nothing. 

Often, very often, have we to cry out from bitter experience, "My soul cleaves unto the dust; quicken me according unto Your Word!" Psalm 119:25

Quickening Spirit, daily quicken my soul!

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We have published J.R. Miller's helpful short article, "The Cure for Weariness".

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Feel free to forward these gems to others who may be encouraged or profited by them!

Dr. Morris-

      This writer, like most people I have encountered inside the church house, caught in the same satanic trap- snare- plight of not wanting to be "different" from those outside the church house. Our lives have been tainted by the need for acceptance of Satan's crowd... Our dress- language- idols. We had rather be popular- proud- peculiar, than show the born again righteousness of Christ which should be shown in any person who has experienced true repentance, lost that old life of sin and indifference. God inhabits the praise of his people (Psalm 22:3).

      Real Christians, different people, care little about the "acceptance" of an unsaved world. Every minute of every day, I want acceptance of a holy God. We find this in prayer. It is a lifelong learning experience that, when you have notoriety, education accomplishment, success in business, houses and lands, even family and friends, you have what THEY can do. But, when you have a daily minute by minute experience with the holiness of God through prayer, than you have what God can do.

      Look around, look at the news, look at what is happening to our world, WE NEED, WHAT GOD CAN DO.

The Death of Business

#1746

"God grant me the serenity 
To accept the things I cannot change; 
Courage to change the things I can; 
And wisdom to know the difference."

Directions in life, are often determined by unintended consequences. The business model on which all commerce, anywhere around the world, is directed, involves "selling something." Small mom and pop grocery store, a beauty shop at the home or a barber shop at the crossroads, Your neighbors and friends, supplying a source for your need, and trying to make a profit. This 85 year old man well remembers his first self-help store, his first self-help gas station. It is from the sound busiest practices of the self-help- lower price model that Sam Walden built an empire that made his children some of the richest people in America. Only history will tell us what Wal-Mart, stores everywhere in every area of our country, has done to the small business man. The small business man operating with heart, a feeling of family with his customers has died, replaced by an impersonal Wal-Mart model.

It is very much the same with other heartless- hapless corporations such as Amazon and AT&T. The small book seller on Amazon, just wants to make a living, just as the small mom and pop grocery store. But, as this writer found in the huge Communist operations in Russia and China, the personal ingredient, has been taken out of the mega store- corporation. It is only the bottom line that matters. And the, excessive salaries of store and corporate officials. Next to Wal-Mart, the greatest offenders in the American experience, Amazon and AT&T. Even Monsanto and its attempt to control the lifestyle of everyone, does not compare to the poison of Amazon and AT&T. 

Appifiny of the Unwashed

#1745  All things by immortal power,
Near or far,	30
Hiddenly
To each other linkèd are,
That thou canst not stir a flower
Without troubling of a star; -Francis Thompson

Henry Kissinger once said, "The boundaries of history have been marked by the masses of the unwashed."

This writer never takes a shower, never turns a faucet in the kitchen, without thanking God for water. What water means to life, both animal and plant. The fact that water has made the determining factor of almost every event in history. 70% of the Earths crust is covered by water, and makes up 70% of any animals body weight, water determining all plant life (mystery of the ages, routes in the soil, and the magnetism involved in water traveling even to the top of the tallest tree).

I never get out of the shower, without thinking that my ancestors never knew what it was to have a decent bath... The unwashed. 

This world traveler has seen unwashed people, the world over In Africa- Asia, Hundreds of men and women in rivers, beating their dirty clothing against rocks, washing their laundry in a river. 

From one side of the world to the other, people spending their day, with great jugs many times on their heads, transporting water from a creek to their home. 

As with characters in the bible, as with our ancestral forebears, to understand them, we must put flesh and blood on and in their bodies. I fully realize that today and in the 21st century, their are children born who never know their  parents, or knew their grandparents. 

Please God forgive those who do not have "precious memories," who do not have "family ties" to hold onto. 

I have all the empathy in the world, for the unwashed masses whose life is a struggle, in remote corners of the world, which God has blessed me to visit. I must remember, however, my own family. 

In-between the ancient farm homes of both my mother and father, my grandparents, and great- grandparents before them, a distance of about two miles, a curve in the dirt country road. In the grave yard at that curve, are the tomb stones of these, "saints of old" who I want to remember. 

Their were very few photographs back then, most of their ephemera (paper products), destroyed in their activity and just survival of daily life. People just did not prize old things. Every time this world traveler was near a monastery, I thought of the monk who found the sisters in 

Saint Catherine's Monastery

 at  Mount Sinai, burning old biblical scrolls, just trying to stay warm.

We think that God is tough. My ancestors were really tough. Think of their horror story, before leaving England, flaying to keep their Christian belief. Crossing the treacherous Atlantic in a small ship... Sick, some buried at sea. Landing on the shores of this promise land, near Morris town, NJ 1677. Battered by the sea and the New England winters. Think of what they encountered with their very few possessions, clothing- food- tools- medicine. But they eek out of existence out of the soil of New Jersey, founding Morris town. Then the hard working farmers moved south to North- Carolina. 

To show how tough they really were (and only a few family members know this). In my lifetime, few automobiles, cousin Barney, who owned a car, drinking liquor, drove his car into the ditch right there at the graveyard. His family had built our church in 1874, still there- still beautiful. His own family "kicked" him out of the church for drinking. So many times I wanted to tell his beautiful Christian wife and children (now dead and in Heaven), that story.

how things have changed at the church house, the school house, the court house, and all my relatives houses. Places which have had such a tremendous influence on my life. 

I still want to meet a perfect man, other than my blessed lord. My own "warts," "sins," though forgiven, still bother me. But even though we fail him, he never fails us. 

Not only did those folks buried in that graveyard, never have a decent bath, how they suffered from disease, not only wants but needs, at the one room school-house, which even my own mother attended, my grand-parents along with NC education governor Charles B. Aycock, they had to go to the woods and cut wood for the stove. Also buried in the graveyard, aunt Catty, the teacher... Uncle Turner, who once a year would go into a nearby town, and buy ice for everyone's once a year treat, ice-tea and ice-cream (July 4th celebrated at the school house). In the graveyard is my mothers 2 year old brother, who died from a dread disease. Until her death, my grand-mother thought every young boy looked like Seth. 

There is a long line of those in the graveyard who I can remember from stories which were told to me. Such stalwart ancestors, who knew nothing but handwork-hard times, and the all preserving power of God, will keep those of us who had it much easier, from complaining. They never heard a radio, but heard the voice of God from beautiful birds in the trees. They never saw a television set, but saw the hand of God in the lives of the sick and lonely. They never tasted "fast food" but knew the thrill from healthy- green- real food. They did not worry about diet or exercise, because farm work, walking most places, kept them in shape. 

In a world of political correctness, were the price of a soul is so cheap, God help us to remember the values of real Americans, real "Christ like" individuals. 

Speaking Truth

"And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free" (John 8:32).

Faith never judges god by circumstances. Faith is accepting what god gives us. Our faith should guide us through any circumstance, rather than calling on faith to get us through a circumstance. There is little in life more definitive than death. Although the mortality rate is still 100% we shun death. Every time we pass a cemetery, a funeral home, we realize the inevitability of death. When I was young, the Christian family wanted the Christian family members funeral at the church. The only funerals at the funeral home or graveside were those who were not a church member, who had never made a profession of faith. Now, expensive funerals- cheap families, most Christians have a cheap funeral. The church member, faithful in life to a church, should have their funeral at their church. So it cost more, what better way for a family to spend?

Our world is in a state of confusion. majoring on minor things. A famous nursery rhyme, "Alice in Wonderland", "It makes no difference which road you take if you don't know were you are going." often majoring in minor things, confusion, we are afraid to speak the truth about anything. The world has become politically correct... The pastor as well as the politician. God will surely hold that preacher- pastor accountable, who can stand week after week in front of a congregation, when he knows full well that most of the people to who he is preaching, are just pretending.

One of my pastor friends told me about a recent experience with a death in his church family. One couple in his church had one son, who as a teenager after having been raised in church, took the route of unbelief, settled into a life of drugs, in denial of everything Christian. His family, his parents were unable to reach him in his fall into the bottomless pit of sins... Sin of every type, particularly drugs. In and out of rehabilitation, no one could reach him. And finally, away from home, and the parents who loved him, he died of an overdose. 

His parents asked their pastor if they could have his funeral at the church, they knew that he was well known in the community, not just because he was their son, but he was very popular with many young people. The pastor said, "Only on one condition, that you will allow me to say what needs to be said, and you, his parents, know what that is, that your son is in hell." They agreed. 

Before a full house, after the parents had entered the church, front row, right in front of the casket, the pastor went down and hugged both parents.Then, he said to the congregation, "You will hear something like you have never heard at another funeral. I have discussed this with his parents and they want me to say what I am going to say. You all know, just as I know, that their son never repented... Refused every kindness of this church. Unless, at the last moment of life, god in his mercy chose to save him, he is in hell. Eternally in Hell."

The pastor continued, "I am saying this because, for all you young people who are here, who knew him, knew the life which he had thrown away, knew the sorrow he had brought to his parents, you are heading in the same direction, unless you make a change in your life."

He said he could tell the words had an effect on those young people there. Many having never been inside a church house before. Most did not know how to even dress in respect for a funeral. This writer does not know much about death-bed repentance- salvation. The thief on the cross who repented has always been a mystery to me. Here is a man who was crucified next to our blessed lord. We know nothing about him other than he was a thief. If he had not been a thief, IF he had not been crucified next to Jesus, would he have been saved?

Climbing the rungs of ladder of life, the serious- intelligent person looks around. There are so many things that simply do not make sense. The person-hood of parents raising children who are snatched right from their grasp by Satan. Many church going parents have not realized that children see around the corner... That Sunday school and church are not important unless they see their parents taking the bible seriously. How often do your children see you reading the bible in the home? You fuss about the ten commandments being displayed at the court house, what about the school house? Church house, your house?  You fuss about health costs- Obama Care, do you realize that all corn, the most edible food in America, is GMO produced (Genetically Modified)? The most dangerous biological in nutrition. We fuss about so many people dying of cancer. Do you realize that one third of the population of America have cancer? Heading toward one half of the population of Europe having cancer? Like the poverty level of LBJ's time, 15%, poverty, is now more than 15%. With the Billions given For Haiti earthquake relief, Haiti is now in worse shape than before the earthquake or the earthquake funds. But, many big wheels like Bill Clinton got rich from it. What happens to all the money given to study nutrition, to study cancer. To bring relief to a sick world. The rich get richer and the poor get poorer. Charity, giving churches as well as "do-gooder" groups, need discipline- oversight in a god soaked way. 

Everything about life is a matter of grace, the grace of god... Gift to the undeserving. "I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me" (Psalm 23). 

We can depend on the chastening- correcting, rod and staff of god to guide us in truth. 

#1728