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

"And He is the head of the body, the church." -Colossians 1:18 [KJV] Sweet view of Jesus! Ponder well the subject, my soul, and behold thy Lord in this endearing character, and thine own personal union with Him. Jesus is indeed, in every point of view, "the head of His body, the church." He is so by the Father's own appointment, as our glorious Surety: in which character He stood up at the call of God the Father, from everlasting; for when, at that call, He put Himself in our stead, in our law-room and place, He undertook, as the church's representative, to do all, and to suffer all for her; and what He did and suffered, they, as His body, might truly be said to do and suffer in Him. Sweet thought! When Jesus obeyed the whole law, then was Jesus their law-fulfiller. When He suffered the death of the cross, they in Him were crucified. When He arose from the dead, in that resurrection they partook of the triumph, and, as members of His body, arose...

"As dying, and, behold, we live." -II Corinthians 6:9 [KJV] Though we die, and die daily, yet, behold, we live; and in a sense, the more we die, the more we live. The more we die to self, the more we die to sin; the more we die to pride and self-righteousness, the more we die to creature strength; and the more we die to nature, the more we live to grace. And this runs all the way through the life and experience of a Christian. Nature must die, that grace may live. The weeds must be plucked up, that the crop may grow; the flesh be starved, that the spirit may be fed; the old man put off, that the new man may be put on; the deeds of the body be mortified, that the soul may live unto God. As then we die, we live. The more we die to our own strength, the more we live to Christ's strength; the more we die to creature hope, the more we live to a good hope through grace; the more we die to our own righteousness, the more we live to Christ's righteousness; and t...

  “Look Unto Me, and Be Ye Saved”   -Isaiah 45:22 [KJV] Man by nature will always look elsewhere other than Christ and His finished work on the cross for salvation and assurance of salvation. He will look to himself, within himself, to his religious experiences and works. The fact is that any thoughts of salvation or assurance of salvation based upon such notions is an abomination to God (Luke 16:15) and a false refuge for sinners (Matthew 7:21-23). God’s gift of salvation, as set forth in the Gospel of God’s free and sovereign grace in Christ Jesus and based upon HIS blood and righteousness imputed  alone, is so simple and free that the natural man cannot and will not believe it. He reasons in his depraved mind that he must work for it or, at least, have some life-changing experience within to be qualified for it and settle the issue. Although it is true that all who are saved by Christ will experience in the new birth a life-changing experience in receiving Christ by ...

     If the Holy Spirit enables us to be honest, it is a fact that there can be no real inward joy when we evaluate ourselves. Whenever we  look within, we get discouraged because all we see is corruption. Yes, we do believe Christ, but we do not pray enough, we do not read the Bible as much as we ought, we don’t love the Lord like we should, we do not love each other like we are supposed to; our hearts are sometimes cold and seemingly lifeless.  Every thought, every deed, every motive, every imagination is polluted by sin. Who among us can find any comfort in our own conscience with regard to our relationship with a holy God upon the basis of anything within us? Let this be established, the heart can only be genuinely comforted when we look away from self and cast the eyes of our souls upon Christ Jesus the Lord. He is our hope, our joy, our confidence, our  righteousness and our salvation. When we look only to Him, then each of us can say with the prophet...

I was reading an article on the internet last week that posed this question – “What  determines moral truth? Is it rooted in emotion, reason, tradition, or divine authority?” Well, the only right answer to this question is that by divine authority, God alone determines moral truth .    But ever since our fall in and by Adam, fallen, sinful human beings have rebelled against God’s sovereign right to determine moral truth and have aspired to determine truth for ourselves. This was shown in the Garden of Eden by the tree of the knowledge of good and evil – “And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, Of every tree of the garden thou mayest freely eat: but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die” (Genesis 2:16-17).    That tree set forth God’s sovereign right as Creator and Lord to determine what is good and what is evil . When Adam ate of that forbidden fruit, he declar...

JUSTIFIED – NOT MERELY PARDONED   I heard of a soldier who was court-martialed and imprisoned for deserting his post during a battle. Later evidence revealed that he had not deserted his post, and that the charge had resulted from the confusion of the battle. He therefore was told that he would be pardoned. He replied, “I do not want to be pardoned ; I want to be justified .”       He replied rightly. To be pardoned implies admission of guilt. To be justified is to be declared innocent of the offense . He who is innocent may be justified, but he does not need to be pardoned. He who is guilty may be pardoned, but he cannot be justified.       Except by God!       All of us are guilty of violating God’s law and breaking His commandments (Romans 3:23; Ecclesiastes 7:20). We are therefore criminals and sinners before Him. We who acknowledge ourselves as such may pray “For Your name’s sake, O Jehov...