June
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My reward is with Me, to give every man according as his work shall be.—Revelation xxii. 12.
IF I understand things correctly, whenever you *■ find men or. women who are looking to be rewarded here for doing right, they are unqualified to work for God; because if they are looking for the applause of men, looking for reward in this life, it will disqualify them for the service of God.
June 2d.
Lay up for yourselves treasures in heaven; for where your treasure is, there will your heart be also.—Matthew vi. 20.
\/ERY few people are satisfied with earthly riches. Often the richer the man the greater the poverty. Somebody has said that getting riches brings care; keeping them brings trouble; abusing them brings guilt; and losing them brings sorrow. It is a great mistake to make so much of riches as we do. But there are some riches that we cannot praise too much: that never pass away. They are the treasures laid up in heaven for those who truly belong to God.
June 3d.
Waxed strong through faith.—Romans iv. 20. (r. V.) D EAL true faith is man's weakness leaning on A ^ God's strength. It is the Shepherd's business to keep the sheep. Who ever heard of the sheep keeping the shepherd? People have an idea that they have to keep themselves and Christ too. It is a false idea. It is the work of the Shepherd to look after them, and take care of those who trust Him. An Irishman said, on one occasion, that he often trembled, but his Rock never dick
June 4th.
Arise ye and depart, for this is not your rest,— Micah ii. 2.
""THIS world that some think is heaven, is the home of sin, a hospital of sorrow, a place that has nothing in it to satisfy the soul. Men go all over it and then want to get out of it. The more men see of the world the less they think of it. People soon grow tired of the best pleasures it has to offer. Some one has said that the world is a stormy sea, whose every wave is strewed with the wrecks of mortals that perish in it. Every time we breathe some one is dying. We all know that we are going to stay here but a very little while. Only the other life is enduring.
June 5th.
Who is on the Lord's side?—Exodus xxxii. 26.
I was in England in 1867, a friend happened to introduce me to a man from Dublin. Alluding to me, the latter said, "Is this young man all O O?" Said the London man, "What do you mean by O O?" Replied the Dublin man, "Is he Out-and-Out for Christ?" I tell you it burned down into my soul. It means a good deal to be O O for Christ.
June 6th.
Now we see through a glass darkly; but then face to face.—i Corinthians xiii. i2.
""THE word Paul used, properly translated, is
"mirror." Now, we see God, as it were, in a mirror, but then, face to face.
Suppose we knew nothing of the sun except what we saw of its light reflected from the moon? Would we not wonder about its immense distance, about its dazzling splendor, about its life-giving power? But all that we see, the sun, the moon, the stars, the ocean, the earth, the flowers, and above all, man, are a grand mirror in which the perfection of God is imperfectly reflected.
June 7th.
Ye are not under law but under grace.—Romans vi. 14.
WHEN Moses was in Egypt, to punish
Pharaoh he turned the waters into blood. When Chirst was on earth He turned the water into wine. That is the difference between law
and grace. The law says, " Kill him "; grace says, "Forgive him." Law says, "Condemn him "; grace says, "Love him." When the law came out of Horeb three thousand men were destroyed. (Ex. xxxii. 28.) At Pentecost, under grace, three thousand men found life. (Acts ii. 41.) What a difference! When Moses came to the burning bush, he was commanded to take the shoes from off his feet. When the prodigal came home after sinning he was given a pair of shoes to put on his feet. I would a thousand times rather be under grace than under the law.
June 8th.
Everlasting joy.—Isaiah xxxv. 2.
I THINK there is a difference between happiness and joy. Happi-ness is caused by things which happen around me, and circumstances will mar it, but joy flows right on through trouble; joy flows on through the dark; joy flows in the night as well as in the day; joy flows all through persecution and opposition; it is an unceasing fountain bubbling up in the heart; a secret spring which the world can't see and don't know anything about. The Lord gives His people perpetual joy when they walk in obedience to Him.
June 9th.
Arise, shine.—Isaiah lx. 1.
LOVE must be active, as light must shine.
As some one has said: "A man may hoard up his money ; he may bury his talents in a napkin; but there is one thing he cannot hoard up, and that is love." You cannot bury it. It must now out. It cannot feed upon itself; it must have an object.
June 10th.
Wilt thou not tell.—Ezekiel xxiv. 19.
WE may not be able to do any great thing;
but if each of us will do something, however small it may be, a good deal will be accomplished for God. For many years I have made it a rule not to let any day pass without speaking to some one about eternal things. I commenced it away back years ago, and if I live the life allotted to man, there will be more than eighteen thousand persons who will have been spoken to personally by me. How often we as Christians meet with people, when we might turn the conversation into a channel that will lead them up to Christ.
June nth.
And things which are despised, hath God chosen. —i Corinthians i. 28.
MOTICE that all the men whom Christ called around Him were weak men in a worldly sense. They were all men without rank, without title, without position, without wealth or culture. Nearly all of them were fishermen and unlettered men; yet Christ chose them to build up His kingdom. When God wanted to bring the children of Israel out of bondage, He did not send an army; He sent one solitary man. So in all ages God has used the weak things of the world to accomplish His purposes.
Yea the faith that is by Him, hath given him this perfect soundness.—Acts iii. 16.
CAITH is the hand that takes the blessing.
x But don't look too much at the hand. Suppose I ask a man who has just received a thousand dollars of a friend: "Did he give it to you with his right hand?" He would reply: "What do I care about which hand; so that I have got the money."
June 12th.
June 13th.
To every man his work.—Mark xiii. 34.
TF you notice that verse carefully it does not * read "to every man some work," or " to every man a work," but "to every man his work." And I believe that every man and woman living has a work laid out for them to do; that every man's life is a plan of the Almighty, and that away back in the councils of eternity God laid out a work for every one of us. There is no man living who can do the work that God has for me to do, no one but myself. And if any man's work is not done, he will have to answer for it when he stands before the bar of God.
June 14th.
The Lord will give grace and glory.—Psalms lxxxiv. 11.
""THERE is not such a great difference be1 tween grace and glory after all. Grace is the bud, and glory the blossom. Grace is glory begun, and glory is grace perfected. It will not come hard to people who are serving God down here to do it when they go up yonder. They will change places, but they will not change employments.
June 15TH.
The things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.—2 Corinthians iv. 18.
""THE heir to some great estate, while a child, thinks more of a dollar in his pocket than all his inheritance. So even some professing Christians are more elated by a passing pleasure than they are by their title to eternal glory.
June 16th.
Faith without works is dead.—James ii. 20. VfOU may very often see dead fish floating
with the stream, but you never saw dead fish swimming against it. Well, that is your false believer. Profession is just floating down the stream, but «»fession is swimming against it, no matter how strong the tide.
June 17th.
Blessed are ye when men . . . persecute you.—Matthew v. 4.
I ISTEN to Paul in the jail at Philippi. "If God wants me to go to heaven by way of this prison," he says, "it is all the same to me; rejoice and be exceeding glad, Silas. I thank God that I am accounted worthy to suffer for Jesus' sake." And as they sang their praises to God, the other prisoners heard them; but, what was far more important, the Lord heard them, and the old prison shook. Talk about Alexander the Great making the world tremble with his armies. Here is a little tent-maker who makes the world tremble without any army!
June 18th.
/ am the light of the world.—John vii. 12.
T HEARD of an infidel once who said, " Look * at your convert; it is all moonshine." The young convert replied to him, "I thank you for the compliment. We are perfectly willing to be called that. The moon borrows the light from the sun, and so we borrow ours from Christ."
June 19th.
Though He was rich yet for your sakes He became poor.—2 Corinthians viii. 9.
""THIS poor world is groaning and sighing for sympathy—human sympathy. I am quite sure it was that in Christ's life which touched the hearts of the common people. He made Himself one with them. He who was rich for our sakes became poor. He was born in the manger so that He might put Himself on a level with the lowest of the low.
June 20th.
Take ye away the stone.—John xi. 39.
DEFORE the act of raising Lazarus could be performed, the disciples had their part to do. Christ could have removed the stone with a word. It would have been very easy for Him to have commanded it to roll away, and it would have obeyed His voice, as the dead Lazarus did when He called him back to life. But the Lord would have His children learn this lesson: that they have something to do toward raising the spiritually dead. The disciples had not only to take away the stone, but after Christ had raised Lazarus they had to " loose and let him go."
June 21st.
Like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest.—Isaiah lvii. 20.
""THE only thing that can keep us from peace
upside down. There is no peace for the wicked, saith my God. They are like the troubled sea that cannot rest, casting up filth and mire all the while; but peace with God by faith in Jesus Christ—peace through the knowledge of forgiven sin, is like a rock; the waters go dashing and surging past, but it abides.
God turneth the way of the wicked June 22d.
Do good . . . hoping for nothing again.—Luke vi. 35
T OVE never looks to see what it is going to get in return. I have generally found that those workers who are all the time looking to see how much they are going to get from the Lord are never satisfied. But love does its work and makes no bargain.
June 23d.
Born again, not of corruptible seed but of incorruptible.—1 Peter i. 23.
OD has not only adopted us, but we are His by birth: we have been born into His kingdom. My boy was as much mine when he was a day old as now that he is fourteen. He was my son; although it did not appear what he would be when he attained manhood. He is mine; although he may have to undergo probation under tutors and governors. The children of God are not perfect; but we are perfectly His children.
June 24th.
Note faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.—Hebrews xi. 1.
•"THIS is the Bible definition of Faith. The best definition I ever saw outside the Bible is: Dependence on the veracity of another. In other words, Faith says Amen to everything that God says. Faith takes God without any "IPs." If God says it, Faith says, "I believe it"; Faith says "Amen " to it.
June 25th.
So vie see that they could not enter in because of unbelief.—Hebrews iii. 19.
\17HEN the Israelites first came out of Egypt * God would have led them right up into the land of Canaan if it had not been for their accursed unbelief. But they desired something besides God's word; so they were turned back, and had to wander in the desert for forty years. I believe there are thousands of God's children wandering in the wilderness still. The Lord has delivered them from the hand of the Egyptian, and would at once take them through the wilderness right into the Promised Land, if they were only willing to follow Christ. Christ has been down here, and has made the rough places smooth, and the dark places light, and the crooked places straight. If we will only be led by Him right into the land of promise, all will be peace, and joy, and rest.
June 26th. / rejoiced greatly when the brethren testified of the truth that is in thee.—3 John i. 3.
"THERE is more than one kind of joy; there is the joy of one's own salvation. I thought, when I first tasted that, it was the most delicious joy I had ever known, and that I could never get beyond it. But I found, afterward, there was something more joyful than that, the joy of the salvation of others. Oh, the privilege, the blessed privilege, to be used of God to win a soul to Christ, and to see a man or woman being led out of bondage by some act of ours. To think that God should condescend to allow us to be co-workers with Him! It is the highest honor we can have. It surpasses the joy of our own salvation, this joy of seeing others saved, and walking in the truth.
June 27th. They looked unto Him and were lightened.—Psalm xxxiv. 5.
TF you want to scatter your doubts, look at the blood; and if you want to increase your doubts, look at yourself. You will get doubts enough for years by being occupied with yourself only a few days.
June 28th. We give thanks to God and the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ . . . for the hope which is laid up for you in heaven.—Colossians i. 3, 5.
A GREAT many persons imagine that anything said about heaven is only a matter of speculation. They talk about heaven much as they would about the air. Now there would not have been so much in Scripture on this subject if God had wanted to leave the human race in darkness about it. "All Scripture," we are told, "is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness, that the man of God may be perfect—thoroughly furnished unto all good works." What the Bible says about heaven is just as true as what it says about everything else. The Bible is inspired. What we are taught about heaven could not have come to us in any other way than by inspiration. No one knew anything about it but God, and so if we want to find out anything about it we have to turn to His word.
June 29th.
But to him that worketh not, but betieveth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted unto him for righteousness.—Romans iv. 5.
'"THE thief had nails through both hands, so that he could not work; and a nail through each foot, so that he could not run errands for the Lord: he could not lift a hand or a foot toward his salvation; and yet Christ offered him the gift of God, and he took it. He threw him a passport, and took him with Him into paradise.
June 30th.
But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, longsuffering, gentleness, faith, meekness, goodness, temperance: against such there is no law.—Galatians v. 22, 23.
HTHE fruit of the Spirit begins with love. * There are nine graces spoken of, and of these nine Paul puts love at the head of the list; love is the first thing, the first in that precious cluster of fruit. Some one has said that all the other eight can be put in terms of love. Joy is love exulting; peace is love in repose; longsuffering is love on trial; gentleness is love in society; goodness is love in action; faith is love on the battlefield; meekness is love at school; and temperance is love in training. So it is love all the way; love at the top, love at the bottom, and all the way along down this list of graces. If we only just brought forth the fruit of the Spirit, what a world we would have! Men would have no desire to do evil.