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ALL OF "GRACE QUOTES" FROM MAY 2003

By Grace Gems
ALL OF "GRACE QUOTES" FROM MAY 2003 IN ONE FILE Microscopic love? (John MacDuff, "The Night Dream of the Desert") Our Omnipotent God keeps watch over the lichen on the rock, and the lily on the mountain side. He tempers His wind to the fragile flower as it trembles on the lip of the Alpine glacier. He follows the timid bird to its cleft; feeds the young raven's brood; and notes the fall of the sparrow. "Are not two sparrows sold for a penny? Yet not one of them will fall to the ground apart from the will of your Father. And even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. So don't be afraid; you are worth more than many sparrows." Matthew 10:29-31 We see here, the personal love of God for every individual member of His vast family. The heavenly Shepherd has a special, particular care for each sheep of the fold. As it utters its apparently unheard bleat on the lonely moorland, or amid the thorny thicket of its wanderings, He tracks its truant footsteps, as if it engrossed all His interest, restoring it to the green pastures by the side of the fold. Yes, there is surely nothing more cheering, more sublime, than the thought of this unwearying tending of the Great Shepherd; this individual, (if we may so call it), this microscopic love, of our Great Father. If the world satisfies you? (The following was written by Whitmore Winslow at the age of 14. It was gleaned from his journal, which was unknown to his family, until found among his papers after his death, at the age of 21) No being knows the trials I have undergone the past week, but Jesus. And as He only knows, so He only can help me through. I have felt such a willingness to die! a feeling that death would be no dreadful thing to me, having a wish to leave this more dreadful world. But painful, yet no less blessed trial has done it all. And oh, may I be able from my heart to thank God for having made the world my enemy, and Christ my Friend! But mark this: if the world does not suit you, you will be sure to have a welcome in heaven. But if the world satisfies you, hell will be the most adapted to receive you. The obstinate man (Alexander Whyte, "Pictures from Pilgrim's Progress) "Do not be like the the mule . . ." Psalm 32:9 Most unfortunately, it is in the very best things of life that the true 'mulishness' of the obstinate man most comes out. He shows worst in his home life. The obstinate man may be affable, entertaining, the best of company, when abroad with others. But when he turns the latch key in his own door, he will instantly relapse into silence, and sink back into utter . . . boorishness, bearishness, mulishness and doggedness. His sunshine, his smile, and his refinement is all gone now; he is discourteous to nobody but to his own wife. The obstinate man makes his house a very prison to himself and to all those who are condemned to suffer with him! Little Obstinate (Alexander Whyte, "Pictures from Pilgrim's Progress) "Do not be like the the mule . . ." Psalm 32:9 Little Obstinate was born and brought up in the City of Destruction. His father was old 'Spare the Rod', and his mother's name was 'Spoil the Child'. Little Obstinate was the only child of his parents. He was born when they were no longer young, and they doted on their only child, and gave him his own way in everything. Everything he asked for he got, and if he did not immediately get it you would have heard his screams and his kicks three doors off! His parents were not in themselves bad people, but, if Solomon speaks true, they hated their child, for they gave him all his own way in everything, and nothing would ever make them say 'no' to him, or lift up the ROD when he said 'no' to them. Little Obstinate's two parents were far from ungodly people, though they lived in such a city; but they were daily destroying their only son by letting him always have his own way, and by never saying no to his greed, and his lies, and his anger, and his noisy and disorderly ways. Eli in the Old Testament was not a bad man, but he destroyed both the ark of the Lord and himself and his sons also, because his sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them not. The meekness, the sweetness, the docility, and the love of a chastised child has gone to all our hearts in a way we can never forget. There is something sometimes almost past description in the way a chastised child clings to and kisses the hand that chastised it. But poor old 'Spare the Rod' never had experiences like that. And little Obstinate, having been born like Job's wild donkey's colt, grew up to be a man like David's unbridled mule, until in after life he became the author of all the evil and mischief that is associated in our minds with his evil name. In old 'Spare the Rod's' child also this true proverb was fulfilled, that 'the child is the father of the man'. For all that little Obstinate had been in the nursery, in the schoolroom, and in the playground; all that, only in an aggravated way; he was as a youth and as a grown up man. As to the cure of obstinacy; the ROD in a firm, watchful, wise, and loving hand will cure it. And much agonizing prayer will above all cure it. "He who spares the ROD hates his son, but he who loves him is careful to discipline him." Proverbs 13:24 "Folly is bound up in the heart of a child, but the ROD of discipline will drive it far from him." Proverbs 22:15 "Do not withhold discipline from a child; if you punish him with the ROD, he will not die. Punish him with the ROD and save his soul from death." Proverbs 23:13-14 "The ROD of correction imparts wisdom, but an undisciplined child disgraces his mother." Proverbs 29:15 You owe the whole to sovereign grace! (Henry Law, "Deuteronomy" 1858) Believer! Only the grace of God makes you to differ from the world around you! You once were dead in trespasses and sins. You moved as a living carcass with a lifeless soul. Your every step was hellward. Your every moment hurried you towards endless woe. Your life was . . . ignorance, rebellion, slavery, disgrace. But now the darkness is dispersed, and true light shines. You see the cross! You stand in a new world of spiritual delight. You are a new creation of thought, affection, hope, desire. You live for God; to God; with God; in God. But whence the change? Did it result your own resolve? Did rolling years beget this wisdom? Oh, no! You owe the whole to sovereign grace! God, of His own free will, looked down with favor on your ruined soul. His grace gave you, as a jewel, to His Son; and gave His Son to be your uttermost salvation! You owe the whole to sovereign grace! The silly moth is caught! (Henry Law, "Deuteronomy" 1858) Why is this world such a wide sea of evil? Why do earth's multitudes roll so easily to hell? The tastes of the mass of the human race are groveling and vile. They only care to sip the vulgar cup of time and sense. Their sin soiled garments and polluted feet prove, that they wallow in defiling mire. See the worldling. A temptation meets him. A gilded bait allures. A sweet indulgence opens its inviting arms. What follows? The silly moth is caught! Pleasure whispers, "Come and partake." Desire acquiesces. Nature surrenders. Thus Satan leads his crowds down misery's downward slope. Quickly; easily; they glide along. The rolling pebble has no power to stop. The downhill torrent is incapable of turning. To them, liberty is unknown. The clash of heavy chains attests their bondage. Satan drags them; and they must obey. The world gives laws; they tremblingly submit. They crouch the slaves of many an insulting tyrant. Filled with the red wine of righteous wrath! (Spurgeon, "Nearness to God" #851) The great attracting magnet of the gospel is the doctrine of the cross. God is glorified because Christ was punished for the sin of His people. On the cross we see sin fully punished and yet fully pardoned. We see justice with her gleaming sword triumphant; and mercy with her silver scepter prevailing in sublimest splendor. Glory be to the wondrous wisdom which discovered the way of blending vengeance with love, making a tender heart to be the mirror of unflinching severity, causing the crystal vase of Jesus' loving nature to be filled with the red wine of righteous wrath. The omnipotent grace of God (MacDuff, "A Chapter in Providence and Grace") The omnipotent grace of God can change and transform the worst and most hopeless; quicken those who are dead; and animate the groveling spirit with . . . new motives, new principles, new tastes, new feelings, new aspirations! No serpent crawls along that pavement! (Henry Law, "The Gospel in Numbers" 1858) Heaven! It is . . . our looked for rest; the goal to which we press; the haven of our storm tossed voyage; the end of weary pilgrimage; the soul's eternal home; the land of every delight! Heaven! Here . . . thought flags; mind fails; all words seem emptiness; all images fall short. No angel's tongue can adequately paint the brightness of those realms. Mortal powers shrink into very nothingness. None can describe heaven, but those who enter it. And those who enter it, find their delight . . . an ever swelling flood; an ever brightening day; an ever opening flower; a volume, which eternity cannot read through! Heaven! It is the palace of the great Eternal. Salvation is its walls; its gates are praise. Its pavement is purity's most golden luster. Its atmosphere is perfect love. Heaven! It is the home prepared by God before the worlds were made, for His redeemed children. It is the mansion, which the ascended Jesus still labors to make fit. Heaven! It is so attractive, that all Jehovah's skill cannot increase the beauty. It is so full, that nothing can be added. It is so rich, that it can hold no more. Perfection is the essence of our heaven. Nothing can enter there . . . to stain, to soil, to vex, to humble. Oh! what a contrast to our present state! Our hearts are daily pierced. We loathe and we abhor ourselves. We would be holy; but, alas! a treacherous adversary rolls us in the mire. The foul tempter all day long is spreading nets. There is no saint too saintly for his vile approach. But in heaven this misery has ceased. No serpent crawls along that pavement! Satan is outside; far off; the bottomless pit has shut its mouth upon him. Our high home is barricaded against all sin. Never, never, never, can iniquity again intrude. The soul forever joys; righteous, as God is righteous; pure, as God is pure. Reader, seek heaven. God's dealings with a sin slain race! (Henry Law, "Numbers" 1858) "Buds will sprout on the rod belonging to the man I choose . . . When he went into the Tabernacle of the Covenant the next day, Moses found that Aaron's rod, representing the tribe of Levi, had budded, blossomed, and produced almonds!" (see Numbers 17:1-8) The twelve rods at first seem all alike. They are all sapless twigs. The same grove saw their birth. Man's eye sees but one likeness in their dry forms. But suddenly one puts forth loveliness; while the others still remain worthless and withered. Here is a picture of God's dealings with a sin slain race! Since Adam's fall, all are born lifeless branches of a withered stock. Many abide so, and thus pass as fuel to the quenchless fire. But in a chosen remnant, a new birth occurs. The grave sprouts into life. The sapless put forth buds. Blossoms appear. Fruit ripens. Whence is the difference? It is not nature's work. No dry stick can restore itself. No 'withered helplessness' can deck itself with verdure. This cannot be. When any man arises from the death of sin, and blooms in grace, God has arisen with divine almightiness. Free, sovereign love decrees rebirth. Boundless power achieves it. What is its voice of the Budded Rod to unregenerate worldlings? Alas! these are a forest of sticks, wholly dry. The curse, which fell on Eden's garden, blasted their nature to the core. Thus withered they were born. Thus withered they continue. What will their end be? That end draws near. What then awaits them? Can they be beams and rafters in the palace of heaven's King! Oh, no! The decree is sure. Faithfulness has warned. Almighty power will execute. "That, which bears thorns and briers, is rejected, and is near unto cursing, whose end is to be burned." Heb. 6:8. What! (Henry Law, "Numbers" 1858) Earth is affliction's home. A troop of sorrows compass us about. Tears stream. The bosom sighs. The brow is furrowed by the lines of care and worry. Death tears away the much loved friend. Sickness invades the frame. The home is desolate. The table is destitute. We look to the right hand, and there is trouble; on the left, and still fresh troubles frown. But heaven is a wide sea of bliss without a ripple. All tears are wiped away. All faces beam with one enraptured smile. All lips confess, 'The cup of happiness overflows'. We bathe in oceans of delight. In heaven . . . sin is shut out; temptations banished; fears buried in an unfathomable grave; sorrow and unbelief have fled away; knowledge is perfect; our souls are purity; our bodies are imperishable beauty; we completely share the glory of our all glorious Lord. Jesus is the crown of heaven! This is the pinnacle of bliss! The revelation of the Lord, without one intervening cloud, is the grand glory of the endless kingdom. Heaven is full heaven, because Christ shines there exactly as He is; seen and admired by every eye. In heaven Jesus ever stands conspicuous in one undiminishable blaze! Believer, what will it be to gaze on the manifested beauty of Him, who is so altogether lovely! What! to read clearly all the deep mysteries of His redeeming will! What! to dive down to the vast depths of His unfathomable heart! What! to fly upward to the very summit of His boundless love! What! to trace clearly all His dealings in providence and grace! What! to comprehend all that Jesus is! What! never to lose sight of Him; no, not for a moment! What! to be ever drinking fresh raptures from His present smile! What! to feel, that this joy is mine forever! This! this is heaven! One incessant fight! (Henry Law, "Numbers" 1858) The life of faith is one incessant fight. Beneath the cross, a sword is drawn, of which the scabbard is cast far away. Until the victor's crown is won, unflinching combat must go on. The foes are . . . many, mighty, wily, restless. They meet us, at each step. They lurk in every corner. They infest our public walk. They enter our closed doors. They are outside; around; within. Count, if you can, the hateful legions who compose hell's hosts. They all rush at the soul. Survey the WORLD . . . its snares, its foul seductions, its enticing arts, its siren calls, its smiles, its venomed sneers, its terrifying threats. Each in its turn assails; and each, when foiled, renews the assault. Behold the HEART, and all its brood of lusts and raging passions. How often it betrays! How often it deceives! Believer go forth in hope! You have a Captain, by whose side no battle can be lost; beneath whose banner, no warrior was ever slain. Face all your foes. Grasp manfully your sword. Use skillfully your shield. Lift up the head, safe in salvation's helmet. Shout boldly your great Leader's name. The fight will soon be over. The victor's song will soon be on your lips! The vilest reptile and the proudest prince? (Henry Law, "Numbers" 1858) "All your life you will sweat to produce food, until your dying day. Then you will return to the ground from which you came. For you were made from dust, and to the dust you will return." Gen. 3:19 What is our body? It is nothing but clay! These bodies have one origin; the dust. The vilest reptile and the proudest prince are composites of one poor mire. Is it not folly, then, to pamper and admire this flesh? How soon our bodies crumble back to dust! No care; no thought; no art can lengthen out their continuance. The countless families of foregone ages; where are they now? Dust they were. To dust they are gone back! The many families of this our day; where are they speeding to? Dust they are. To dust they hasten! How fleeting is life's day! The bodies must fall. But when? Perhaps this very hour! Is he not then the fool of fools, who boasts himself of tomorrow's dawn! Happy the inhabitants of these crumbling bodies, if only they are Christ's! They now are vilest dust! They soon will shine more brightly than ten thousand suns! Their vile bodies shall be changed! Weakness and frailty shall put on unfading freshness! The lowly bud shall bloom into a glorious flower! The expulsive power of a new affection. (John MacDuff, "Paul's Song of Songs") "But you are not controlled by your sinful nature. You are controlled by the Spirit if you have the Spirit of God living in you." Romans 8:9 God has made gracious provision to secure, on the part of His ransomed people, a holy walk and obedience; and that, not through their own strength, but through the strength and power of His indwelling Spirit. By that Spirit we are not only renewed, but 'led;' sweetly constrained to walk in harmony with the divine will, and the impulses of our regenerated natures. We have here what is called the expulsive power of a new affection. It is a plant which our Heavenly Father plants. Not indigenous to the natural soil of the human heart; it is of supernatural growth. The power of sin becomes slowly weaker and weaker. The power of grace, slowly, it may be imperceptibly, becomes stronger and stronger. Reader, have you in any feeble measure, been able to realize the presence and power of this indwelling Spirit; conscious of the surrender of heart and life to Christ; implying the gradual conquest of sin; the expulsion of whatever is base and impure, corrupt and selfish, grasping and covetous, unloving and unholy; our wills blending in greater harmony with the divine? The slimy trail and the deadly venom of the serpent! (Winslow, "Counsel and Consolation for the Tempted") "So that Satan will not outsmart us. For we are very familiar with his evil schemes." 2 Cor. 2:11 There is nothing in our individual history which Satan may not make the occasion and instrument of a temptation. Our social position in the world may be one of peculiar snare; our calling in life especially so; our sore trials, crushing afflictions, and pressing needs all may furnish ample material for the purpose and schemes of the Enemy. Yes, there is nothing that may not be an instrument of great temptation: our poverty or wealth; our exalted position or our low estate; the publicity, or the privacy of our life; our loves and hatreds; our friends and foes; may all become powerful engines of evil in the hands of our great, terrible, powerful, and unslumbering Enemy. The books we read; the literature we cultivate; the science we pursue; the recreations we indulge; yes, the very religion we profess, and the Christian service we promote; may, with all their apparent innocence and sanctity, but conceal from our eye the slimy trail and the deadly venom of the serpent! He gave so much that He could give no more! (Henry Law, "Gleanings from the Book of Life") With what a price has Christ redeemed His people! He paid not silver and gold for their ransom. He gave not all the precious things of earth as their equivalent. He heaped not worlds upon worlds and placed them as payment in the balance of God's justice. All such expenditure would have been as unavailing as the chaff. He gave . . . Himself, His life, His blood. He gave so much that He could give no more! And He gave this to bear the extremest curse of God, to endure all the punishment, and all the miseries, and all the anguish which His people must have suffered if they had wailed through all the endless ages amid the torments of the lost! A vast hospital of anguish (John MacDuff, "The Dirge of Creation") "Our dying bodies make us groan and sigh." 2 Cor. 5:4 The wailing lamentation has been voiced for six millenniums: "Naked I came from my mother's womb, and naked I will depart." Job 1:21 Everywhere we see . . . the suffering of sick beds, the agony of bereavement, the sudden close of lives of promise, human ties formed only to be sundered, births superseded by deaths, marriage chimes followed by the funeral bell. Yes, say as we will; this world, while a home of beauty, the vestibule of heaven; may be described, with equal truth, as a vast hospital of anguish; a cemetery and receptacle for the dead! "He will take these weak mortal bodies of ours and change them into glorious bodies like His own." Phil. 3:21 What is heaven? (Henry Law, "Holy Blood") Heaven is one ocean of repose. No billow heaves. No storm affrights. No foe can enter. No change can cloud the calm expanse of the unruffled sky. But what is heaven, but to see Christ as He is; to gaze forever on His unveiled beauty; to sit with Him; to realize, that never for one moment can there be absence from Salvation's home? Heaven is heaven, because it is an eternal rest by the side of Jesus. Our journey is drawing to an end. (Mary Winslow, "Life in Jesus") Bless God with me, that we are both so near our home, each day's travel bringing us nearer and nearer. Our eyes shall behold Him whom our souls love beyond all created good. What a prospect is before us! Forever with the Lord! Our journey is drawing to an end. Look forward, look upward. Jesus' eye is upon you; His heart is towards you. A few more severe trials, a few more staggering steps, and we are there! Come what may (Written by Whitmore Winslow at the age of 14. It was gleaned from his journal, which was unknown to his family, until found among his papers after his unexpected death, at the age of 21.) I had some sweet sights of Jesus by faith, some feeble glimmerings of the happiness and glory which we shall realize above. It is only these glorious feelings that will solace the Christian in his toilsome journey through this weary world. Come what may, pleasure or pain, happiness or woe, life or death, I am in the hands of the Lord of Creation, the King of kings, and in His keeping no evil will befall me. The thorns (Octavius Winslow, "Christ and the Christian in Temptation" 1877) "All this I will give you," he said, "if you will bow down and worship me." Matthew 4:9 Alas! the world constitutes one of the most seductive temptations of the Christian. The world is Satan's great weapon. Satan is constantly presenting it in endless forms of attraction, wearing as many disguises, and backed by every species of argument. It is his chicanery to present only the bright side of the world, carefully concealing the darker and more repulsive one. He presents the flower; and conceals the thorns . . . its emptiness and heartlessness, its selfishness and malice, its deceitfulness and malignity, its ingratitude and baseness, its hollow friendships and its false loves. Oh! these are the thorns the cunning Tempter conceals when he presents the world and the glory thereof, in exchange for the homage and the worship he asks. There is not a stratagem Satan does not employ by which to bring the world to bear upon the Christian . . . the eye delighting in beauty; the ear ravished with sounds; the taste delicate and dainty. "The lust of the flesh and the lust of the eye and the pride of life" are so many media through which the attractive power and ascendancy of the world attain an easy conquest in the mind of the Christian. Seduced by its power, convinced by its arguments, ensnared by its glitter, the world may enchained you a slave at its feet. The deceiver attempts to draw . . . the heart from Christ; the mind from devout meditation; and the whole soul from things that are divine, heavenly and eternal! The Gospel (Octavius Winslow, "Morning Thoughts") The gospel is the 'master work' of Jehovah, presenting the greatest display of His manifold wisdom, and the most costly exhibition of the riches of His grace. In constructing it He would seem to have summoned to His aid all the resources of His own infinity . . . His fathomless wisdom, His boundless love, His illimitable grace, His infinite power, His spotless holiness, all contributed their glory, and conspired to present it to the universe as the most consummate piece of Divine workmanship! The revelations it makes, the facts it records, the doctrines it propounds, the effects is produces, proclaim it to be the "glorious gospel of the blessed God." We live encircled by SHADOWS . . . our friends are shadows, our comforts are shadows, our supports are shadows, our pursuits are shadows, and we ourselves are shadows passing away. But in the precious gospel we have SUBSTANCE, we have reality, we have that which remains with us when all other things disappear, leaving the soul desolate, the heart bleeding, and the spirit bowed in sorrow to the dust. But the gospel . . . guides our perplexities, mitigates our griefs, sanctifies our sorrows, heals our wounds, dries our tears, because it leads us to . . . the love, the tenderness, the sympathy, the grace of JESUS. The gospel . . . reveals Jesus, speaks mainly of Jesus, leads simply to Jesus, and this makes it "glad tidings of great joy," to a poor, lost, ruined, tried, and tempted sinner! Can he embrace the monster? (Henry Law, "Leviticus") He most flees sin, whose eye is riveted upon the Cross. Can he love that which gave those wounds to Christ? Can he embrace the monster, which pierced Jesus' heart? It cannot be! The sight of Calvary slays the love of sin. The Cross unmasks the hideous form, and kindles righteous hate. Bring me your misery (Henry Law, "Leviticus") Christ is a sure and present help. Trials thicken; temptations threaten; and affliction's tide runs strong. Death, also, draws near, and shows a chilling form. But still take comfort. He, who is with you, has . . . an arm of power; a heart of tenderness; and a voice of love. In deepest billows, He will hold you up. And the last wave will waft you safely to Canaan's shore. Thick blows may batter, but will not beat down. The last blow breaks the gates of flesh, and sets your happy spirit free. Reader, there is no need in life; in death; in present or in future days; for which Christ is not an all sufficient support. Behold Him! He is . . . life for the dead, sight for the blind, feet for the lame, strength for the weak, joy for the sad, cleansing for the filthy, freedom for the bound, clothing for the naked, purity for the unclean, redemption for the captive; a God within to cheer, a God above to bless, a God who came in flesh to die, a God who reigns in power to help, a God who comes in glory to receive. Bring me your misery, and I will show you its relief in Christ. He loves, as God. He aids, as God. He saves, as God. All fullness is in Christ for His beloved flock. There are many tyrants! (Henry Law, "Leviticus") "If the Son shall make you free, you shall be free indeed." John 8:36. Each soul, apart from Jesus, is a poor slave. There are many tyrants, and their yoke is hard. SATAN enchains the heart, and drags His vassals to vile service. They have no will; no power, to resist. By nature all lie prostrate at Satan's feet. But Jesus wrestles with this cruel tyrant, hurls him from his throne, breaks his scepter, and gives him a death wound. This vile WORLD, also, a foul tyrant. Its smiles allure. Its frowns deter. Its fashions force compliance. Its laws exact submission. It drives its millions to a slavish toil. But when Jesus unmasks this monster's hideous filth; when He reveals the beauties of the Gospel; then the chain snaps, the tyrant is loathed, and its debasing ways are shunned. The Gospel sets free from the world's snares. Fit for the Bride! (Henry Law, "Psalms" 1878) "For the Lord takes pleasure in His people; He will beautify the meek with salvation." Psalm 149:4 It is the wonder of wonders that the great and glorious God should stoop to regard such creatures as we are. But wonder is immeasurably magnified when we are taught that thoughts of us are pleasure to Him. Not only does He take pleasure in His people, He beautifies the meek with salvation! Meekness is their lovely characteristic. This grace proves them to be followers of Him who avows Himself as meek and lowly in heart. Beautiful robes of salvation are prepared for them. These garments are heavenly in structure, fit for the Bride, the Lamb's wife, suited to adorn the palace of our God. Such is the career of thousands! (Bonar, "The Way Of Cain" 1846) Man is weary, toiling for that which is not bread; trying to wring water out of the world's dry sands and broken cisterns. Such is the career of thousands . . . a fruitless worldliness; a life of vanity; a soul utterly empty; a being wholly wasted. The wretched idol, SELF! (Octavius Winslow, "Christ and the Christian in Temptation" 1877) Of all the sins common to our fallen nature, God has the most signally marked that of Idolatry, or False Worship. Man is by nature an idolater. His sinful mind, being alienated from God, seeks some object of worship other than the true and living God. The 'renewed' man is not entirely exempt from this sin. Hence the exhortation of the Apostle addressed to the early Christians, and in these last days addressed to us: "Little children, keep yourselves from idols." "My dearly beloved, flee from idolatry." Surely, it was not the gross and senseless idolatry of the heathens to which the Apostles thus refer; from this many of those saints to whom they wrote had already been delivered; but to other idols and other worship, less palpable and degrading, but not less superstitious or offensive to God. The worship of SELF is a natural and fearful form of idolatry. It is an innate and never entirely eradicated principle of our nature, but clings to us to the very last of life. Alas! the holiest and the best of us want to be something, and to do something, when in reality we are nothing, and can do nothing. We walk in our religious life, for the most part, upon stilts; always appearing in the eyes of others taller than we really are! But real greatness and true humility have ever been in alliance with entire abnegation of SELF. Who can stand before the cross and gaze upon the Creator of all worlds impaled between two criminals, Himself dying as the chief, and not shrink into his own nothingness, bewailing that he should ever have been betrayed into the folly and the sin of burning the incense of idolatry before the wretched idol, SELF! Beware of SELF idolatry! It is the most insidious, hateful, and degrading form of idolism to which the soul can be subjected. Two paths (Henry Law, "Psalms") "For the Lord watches over the path of the godly, but the path of the wicked leads to destruction." Psalm 1:6 Amid all their trials, sorrows, pains and reproaches; let the godly lift up rejoicing heads. The eye of God rests on their way. He called them to the narrow path. He upholds their feeble steps. He safely leads them to the glorious end. Unfailing watchfulness surrounds them. But the broad path, with its unrighteous throng, goes down assuredly to hell. The sin offering! (Henry Law, "The Sin Offering") "He must bring to the Lord a young bull without defect as a sin offering for the sin he has committed." Leviticus 4:3 Sin! The sound is brief, but it presents a dark abyss of thought. No mind can trace its birth. No eye can see its death. Before the worlds it scaled the heavens, and dragged angels down. In life's first dawn it entered Eden and slew innocence. It ends not with the end of time. It ever rolls an ever deepening course. Reader, think much of sin! It is earth's death blow. It marred the beauty of a beauteous world. It stripped it of its lovely robe. It caused the soil to harden; and the leaves to wither and decay. It turned fertility to weeds, and armed the brier with its bristling thorns. It made the clouds to blacken, and the storm to rage. It raised the tempest's roar, and plumed the lightning with its forked wings. It placed its foot upon a perfect work, and left it a disordered wreck. Reader, think much of sin! It is man's ruin. It drove the soul from peaceful fellowship with God. It changed the loving child into a hardened rebel. It robbed the mind of light. It rendered reason a bewildered maze. Sin made the heart . . . a nest of unclean birds; a spring of impure streams; a whirlpool of tumultuous passions; a hot bed of ungodly lusts; a den of God defying schemes! Sin is . . . the malady; the misery; the shame of our whole race! It is the spring of every tear. Each sigh, which rends the breast; each frown, which ploughs the brow; each pain, which racks the limbs, are cradled in sins arms! It is the mother of that mighty monster, death. It digs each grave in every graveyard. Each widow and each orphan tastes its gall. It fills each hospital with sick. It strews the battlefield with slain. It is the core in every grief. It is the worm which gnaws the root of peace. Reader, think much of sin! Its terrible destructions die not in the grave. There is a region, where its full blown torments reign. It built the prison house of hell. It kindled quenchless flames. It forged the chains, which bind lost sinners to their burning beds. It sharpened the undying sting of an upbraiding conscience. It arms the jailer, Satan, with his scourge. It bars the hopeless in that outer darkness, where weeping ever weeps; and wailing ever wails; and teeth forever gnash; and all is woe, which knows no respite and no end. Reader, here is a picture, in which all horrors meet! Regard it with an earnest eye. No fiction colors it. No power can over paint the terrible reality. No artist's skill can represent a flame. The dreadful truth exceeds report. The lost writhe out eternity in fully learning the deserts of sin! Reader, think much of sin! Though sin is death, the sinner need not die. There is a fortress of escape. There is a remedy to heal these wounds. What though your sins be as countless as the sands? They all may disappear! What though the dye of each be double crimson? Each may be washed away! The filth may all be cleansed! The debts may be wiped out! The soul may meet Jehovah's eye without one stain! There is a way, by which the vilest may stand pure! God's love decreed a plan. He willed a ransom, and His Son achieved it. Let us draw nearer to the amazing sight! Each sin must bear its merited load of woe. Each curse must be endured. Each violation of the holy law must drink the dregs of condemnation. Jesus comes forth to help! The guiltless One, takes the guilty place. He stands as their ready and complete sin offering. He pays in anguish and in blood their every due. Wrath is endured. Penalties are paid. Sufferings are suffered. Agonies are agonized. The work requires infinity of woe. Infinity of woe is borne by Him. Wrathful fury seized the soul of Jesus. All torments dealt most fiercely with Him. He suffered, until eternal vengeance asked no more. Thus sin is fully punished. Thus the redeemed are fully saved. "For God made Christ, who never sinned, to be the offering for our sin, so that we could be made right with God through Christ." 2 Cor. 5:21 Believer, your sins slew Christ! They cannot now slay you. His death is yours. Therefore you live. God's smile is on you, not because you have no sins, but because each has died in Christ. Reader, if you are one with Christ, hell pains are past for you. If you are not, they still remain. Alas! how shall you bear them! Hold me up! (Alexander MacLaren, "Open Sins") "Hold me up, and I shall be safe!" Ps. 119:117 The first lesson we have to learn is that without Divine help we cannot stand; and that with it we cannot fall. We must cultivate a spirit of lowly dependence, of self conscious weakness. We need a mightier strength than our own, which shall curb all this evil nature of ours, and restrain us from sin. When God's Spirit comes into a man's heart, He will deaden his desires after earth and forbidden ways. He will bring blessed higher objects for all our affections. He who has been fed on "the hidden manna" will not be likely to hanker after the leeks and onions that grew in the Nile mud in Egypt, however strong their smell and pungent their taste. He who has tasted the higher sweetnesses of God will have his heart's desires after lower delights, strangely deadened and cooled. My heart, touched by the Spirit of God dwelling in me, will turn to Him, and I shall find little sweetness in the otherwise tempting delicacies that earth can supply. God desires to cleanse us from the filth of the swine trough and the rags of our exile, and clothe us in fine linen, clean and white. If you will put yourselves into His hands, He will give you new powers to detect the serpents in the flowers, and new resolution to shake off the vipers into the fire. "Hold me up, and I shall be safe!" Ps. 119:117

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