"Salvation is of the LORD." -Jonah 2:9

"For Demas hath forsaken me, having loved this present world." -II Timothy 4:10 [KJV]   Was this the same Demas of whom the apostle spake, Colossians 4:14 ? I should hope not. But if it was, it becomes no proof of a man's falling from grace. The apostle no where speaks of this man as being a partaker of grace. And a man cannot fall from grace, who never possessed grace. Professors there may be, who follow the means of grace, as Demas followed Paul; but the world, as in his instance, is still in their heart. But, my soul, what the apostle hath said of him, may well serve for an instruction to thee. If Jesus, and the love of Jesus, with all His sweetness, beauty, suitableness, and delight, be come into thine heart, then will the love of this present world be gone out. Both cannot dwell nor live together in the same heart.   A believer in Christ Jesus will carry with him his affection to Jesus even into the world, wherever the business or duties of life, in the honest maint...

"But ye should say, Why persecute we him, seeing the root of the matter is found in me?" -Job 19:28 [KJV]   In almost every plant it is at the root that disease begins. If ever you see even a plant in a flower-pot unhealthy, depend upon it there is something wrong at the root. It is overwatered or underwatered, or from some other cause the root has become diseased, and what is called "root-action" is suspended or unhealthy. So it is in religion: if there is anything wrong with a man, it is almost sure to be something wrong at the root. "The root of the matter," Job said, "is found in me." Job could appeal unto God that the root of his religion was right. If "the root" had been wrong, "the matter" would not have been right; but as long as the root was sound, like "the teil tree" of which the prophet speaks, though "it cast its leaves, the substance would still be in it," to put forth in due time boughs ...

"Jesus therefore, being wearied with His journey." -John 4:6 [KJV] My soul, art thou wearied with the labours of the day, and glad that the evening of rest is come? Look unto thy Lord! Behold Jesus wearied with His journey. As part of the curse, this, among other consequences, seized upon the Lord of life and glory, from the moment He became flesh: "It behoved Him in all things to be made like unto His brethren." All the sinful frailties and infirmities of our poor nature; all the calamities to which human life is exposed, in the thorns and thistles which the earth is made to bring forth to man, and the dust of death, into which, as Jesus spake by the spirit of prophecy, He knew Jehovah would bring Him (Psalm 22:15) .   These were the very conditions to which the Redeemer subjected Himself, in the days of His flesh, when "He was made sin for us Who knew no sin, that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him : " and hence His whole life was a life...

"To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death; to guide our feet into the way of peace." - Luke 1:79  [KJV] What was it that moved the divine Father to send His own Son into the world? Was it not the free mercy of God flowing forth from His bosom to His family? Then, what merit, what claim can His family ever have? Their misery is their claim. Their worthlessness, their sunken state, the depth of their fall—these things call forth God's compassion. It is not what I have done for the glory of God; not what I am doing, or trying to do; not my wisdom, my strength, my resolutions, my piety, my holiness.   No; my misery, my helplessness, my worthlessness, my deeply sunken state, my fallen condition; which I feel only because of interest in the blood and love of the Lamb—this it is that makes me need God's mercy; and this it is that qualifies me to go to God through Jesus to receive mercy: for "He is able to save unto the uttermost all that co...

Then were the disciples glad, when they saw the Lord. " -John 20:20 [KJV] “Truly the light is sweet, and a pleasant thing it is for the eyes to behold the sun , ” (Ecclesiastes 11:7.) But, O how much more sweet and pleasant, to see the light, and behold the glory of the Sun of Righteousness! This inspires the heart with gladness. These disciples had lost their dear Lord, and mourned in darkness for His absence. Tongue cannot tell their inexpressible joy, at seeing Him again. Their sight was by the eye of sense: ours is by the eye of faith. Yet our sight is not less real than theirs: and it brings the same gladness to our hearts also. Therefore it is highly prized by us . For we can neither live comfortably, walk holily, nor die happily, without seeing the Lord Christ. For,    (1st.) A sight of Christ by faith, brings peace to the conscience. There is ever a war within, between the flesh and the spirit: grace and nature: the old man and the new. The motion of sin in our memb...

"The Tent Dissolved, and the Mansion Entered" (Be sure to   LISTEN to the Audio , as you  READ the text  below.) II Corinthians 5:1-2, "We know that if the earthly tent we live in is destroyed, we have a building from God, an eternal house in Heaven, not built by human hands. Meanwhile we groan, longing to be clothed with our heavenly dwelling." Paul was a maker and mender of tent s. Unlike the substantiality of a house, a tent is a very frail structure . In that respect it is quite like this feeble body of ours, which is crushed before the moth. Our bodies are liable to death from causes so small as to be almost imperceptible: a breath of foul air, a particle of poisonous matter, a trifle, a mere nothing, may end this mortal life. I trust that we duly remember the frailty of our bodies. We are not so foolish as to think that because we are in robust health today, then we must necessarily live to old age. Our crowded cemeteries supply ten thousand argument...