Daily Devotional

August 19, 2018

An Ever Present Help

The Lord is good, a strong hold in the day of trouble; and he knoweth them that trust in him. Nahum 1:7.

We have rich promises in the Word of God, if we only believe and trust in Him. We are in danger of trusting to our own poor human efforts, and not putting our trust in God. Everyone who has any part to act in this great preparation of the work of God for these last days should come close to God. When God sends out His workers to do a special errand for Him, He has pledged Himself to be one with them, if they will be one with God. But if they draw apart from God, and try to do this work in their own strength, they will find difficulties and discouragements at every step. Here we have the promise that in working for the Lord He is by our right hand to help us and work with us.

It would be the greatest folly in the world for any of us to take any of the credit to ourselves for any success we may have. The more humbly we walk with God, the more will He manifest Himself to us to help us. The Lord never designed to send out His servants to do a work for Him with all the opposition of Satan and evil angels against them unless He gives them divine help. The reason that we do not have greater success in the work is because we depend on our own efforts rather than upon the help God will give us. It is our privilege to feel our weakness, our unworthiness, and then claim the help that God has provided for us. We can take the Word in our distress, and while we feel the burden of souls upon us, and say, “Here, Lord, Thou hast promised, and I believe Thy word.”

We must learn to go to our heavenly Father just as a child goes to its earthly parents. He says, “Or what man is there of you, whom if his son ask bread, will he give him a stone? Or if he ask a fish, will he give him a serpent? If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him?” (Matt. 7:9-11). . . .

While every one of God’s workmen should cultivate his powers to the best of his ability, yet he should not trust in these powers. Make of yourselves everything that it is possible for you to make and then trust the rest to God.

From Devotional: Our Father Cares, pp. 239, 240.

Daily Devotional

August 18, 2018

Matchless Love

And the glory which thou gavest me I have given them; that they may be one, even as we are one: I in them, and thou in me, that they may be made perfect in one; and that the world may know that thou hast sent me, and hast loved them, as thou hast loved me. John 17:22, 23.

O what love, what matchless love! Fallen human beings may become so closely united with Christ that they are glorified with Him. On this earth they have followed in His footsteps, laboring as He labored for the souls for whom He died, and when He comes to claim His own, they enter in to His joy, sitting with Him at His table in His kingdom. “Where I am,” He says, “there shall also my servant be” (John 12:26). . . .

What a wonderful thought it is that we, poor, fallen sinners, can become one with Christ, partakers of His divine nature, through His grace refined, purified, glorified. We may overcome, and sit down with . . . Christ. We are to be conformed to His image. He loves, and He will help us. We are to be passive in His hands.

We have His promise. We hold the title deeds to real estate in the kingdom of glory. Never were title deeds drawn up more strictly according to law, or signed more legibly, than those that give God’s people a right to the heavenly mansions. “Let not your heart be troubled,” Christ says: “ye believe in God, believe also in me. In my Father’s house are many mansions: if it were not so, I would have told you. I go to prepare a place for you. And if I go and prepare a place for you, I will come again, and receive you unto myself; that where I am, there ye may be also” (chap. 14:1-3). . . .

All who will may come under the covenant promise. Precious is the price paid for our redemption—the blood of the only begotten Son of God. Christ was tried by the sharp proving of affliction. His human nature was tried to the uttermost. He bore the death penalty of man’s transgression. He became the sinner’s substitute and surety. He is able to show the fruit of His sufferings and death, in His resurrection from the dead. From the rent sepulcher of Joseph rings forth the proclamation, “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in Me, and do the works of righteousness that I do, are justified, sanctified, made white and tried. They have obtained godliness and eternal life.”

From Devotional: Our Father Cares, pp. 238, 239.

Daily Devotional

August 17, 2018

Truth Will Triumph

Not walking in craftiness, nor handling the word of God deceitfully; but by manifestation of the truth commending ourselves to every man’s conscience in the sight of God. 2 Cor. 4:2.

There is to be no undermining of the fundamental truths that the Lord has submitted by many miraculous evidences. A voice is to be heard in clear affirmation of the truth, in contradiction to the skepticism and fallacies that have been coming in from the enemy of truth. Reformations will take place, and the working out of the principles of divine truth will reveal growth in grace, for the divine agencies are efficient to enlighten and sanctify the human understanding.

The truth as it is in Jesus, as it was proclaimed by Him when He was enshrouded by the billowy cloud, is verity and truth in this our day, and will just as surely renovate the mind of the receiver as it has renovated minds in the past. Christ has declared, “If they hear not Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded, though one rose from the dead” (Luke 16:31).

As a people, we must prepare the way of the Lord, under the overruling guidance of the Holy Spirit, for the spread of the gospel in its purity. The stream of living water is to deepen and widen in its course. In all fields, nigh and afar off, men will be called from the plow and from the more common commercial business vocations that largely occupy the mind, and will become educated in connection with men who have had experience—men who understand the truth. Through most wonderful workings of God, mountains of difficulty will be removed and cast into the sea. . . .

Those who preach the truth will strive to demonstrate the truth by a well-ordered life and godly conversation. And as they do this, they will become powerful in advocating the truth and in giving it the sure application that God has given it. . . .

The call is to go forth, “Son, go labor today in My vineyard.” As this call is obeyed, the message that means so much to the dwellers on the earth, will be heard and understood. Men will know what is truth. Onward, and still onward, will the work advance. And marked events of Providence will be seen and recognized, in judgments and in blessings. The truth will bear away the victory.

From Devotional: Our Father Cares, pp. 237, 238.

Daily Devotional

August 16, 2018

Without Spot

Even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it; . . . that he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish. Eph. 5:25-27.

We bear the name of Christian. Let us be true to this name. To be a Christian means to be Christlike. It means to follow Christ in self-denial, bearing aloft His banner of love, honoring Him by unselfish words and deeds. In the life of the true Christian there is nothing of self—self is dead. There was no selfishness in the life that Christ lived while on this earth. Bearing our nature, He lived a life wholly devoted to the good of others. . . .

In word and deed Christ’s followers are to be pure and true. In this world—a world of iniquity and corruption—Christians are to reveal the attributes of Christ. All they do and say is to be free from selfishness. Christ desires to present them to the Father “without spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing,” purified through His grace, bearing His likeness.

In His great love, Christ surrendered Himself for us. He gave Himself for us to meet the necessities of the striving, struggling soul. We are to surrender ourselves to Him. When this surrender is entire, Christ can finish the work He began for us by the surrender of Himself. Then He can bring to us complete restoration.

Christ gave Himself for the redemption of the race, that all who believe in Him may have everlasting life. Those who appreciate this great sacrifice receive from the Saviour that most precious of all gifts—a clean heart. They gain an experience that is more valuable than gold or silver or precious stones. They sit together in heavenly places in Christ, enjoying in communion with Him the joy and peace that He alone can give. They love Him with heart and mind and soul and strength, realizing that they are His blood-bought heritage. Their spiritual eyesight is not dimmed by worldly policy or worldly aims. They are one with Christ as He is one with the Father.

Think you not that Christ values those who live wholly for Him? Think you not that He visits those who, like the beloved John, are for His sake in hard and trying places? He finds His faithful ones, and holds communion with them, encouraging and strengthening them.

From Devotional: Our Father Cares, pp. 236, 237.

Daily Devotional

August 15, 2018

Unreserved Surrender

I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me. Gal. 2:20.

God will accept nothing less than unreserved surrender. Half-hearted, sinful Christians can never enter heaven. There they would find no happiness; for they know nothing of the high, holy principles that govern the members of the royal family.

The true Christian keeps the windows of the soul open heavenward. He lives in fellowship with Christ. His will is conformed to the will of Christ. His highest desire is to become more and more Christlike. . . .

Earnestly and untiringly we are to strive to reach God’s ideal for us. Not as a penance are we to do this, but as the only means of gaining true happiness. The only way to gain peace and joy is to have a living connection with Him who gave His life for us, who died that we might live, and who lives to unite His power with the efforts of those who are striving to overcome.

Holiness is constant agreement with God. Shall we not strive to be that which Christ so greatly desires us to be—Christians in deed and in truth—that the world may see in our lives a revelation of the saving power of truth? This world is our preparatory school. While here we shall meet with trials and difficulties. Continually the enemy of God will seek to draw us away from our allegiance. But while we cleave to Him who gave Himself for us, we are safe.

The whole world was gathered into the embrace of Christ. He died on the cross to destroy him who had the power of death, and to take away the sin of every believing soul. He calls upon us to offer ourselves on the altar of service, a living, consuming sacrifice. We are to make an unreserved consecration to God of all that we have and are.

In this lower school of earth we are to learn the lessons that will prepare us to enter the higher school, where our education will continue under the personal instruction of Christ. Then He will open to us the meaning of His Word. Shall we not, in the few days of probation remaining to us, act like men and women who are seeking for life in the kingdom of God, even an eternity of bliss.

From Devotional: Our Father Cares, pp. 235, 236.