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

"A time to weep, and a time to laugh." -ECCLESIASTES 3:4 [KJV] Does a man only weep once in his life? Does not the time of weeping run, more or less, through a Christian's life? Does not mourning run parallel with his existence in this tabernacle of clay? for "man is born to trouble as the sparks fly upwards." Then "a time to kill, and a time to heal; a time to break down, and a time to build up" must run parallel with a Christian's life, just as much as "a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance." Living souls will know many times to weep; they will have often to sigh and cry over their base hearts; to mourn with tears of godly sorrow their backslidings from God; to weep over their broken idols, faded hopes, and marred prospects; to weep at having so grieved the Spirit of God by their disobedience, carnality, and worldliness; to be melted into contrition at the feet of a dying Lord, so

Every child of God is a prodigal and a rebel by birth, by nature and by works. All, apart from restraining grace, will in their rebellion go as far as they can from the Father’s house. They will associate with and join themselves with the very children of the evil one. They will indulge every appetite of the flesh till they are left in such a state so as to be abandoned by the very ones who helped them get in that state. They will spend all, every bit of health, mind, talent, and every resource in self-gratification. They will waste all their substance on what the world calls “living.” They will wallow in the pig sties of this world (both religious and irreligious), eat its filthiest fare ( believe its false gospels and swallow the doctrines of men with ease ) and be found in the bondage, captivity and slavery of the devil (especially legalistic, works religion). Yet, there is one thing they will never do. They will never cease to be God’s sons. They will never fall t

"It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the L ORD ." - LAMENTATIONS 3:26 [KJV] The Lord does not bring His poor and needy children to a throne of grace, and send them away immediately they have come. But His purpose is, to shew them deeply what they are, to make them value His favours, to sink them lower and lower in self, that they may rise higher and higher in Christ, to "teach them to profit" (as the Scripture speaks), to write His laws upon their hearts in lines of the Spirit's drawing, in deep lines, "graven with an iron pen and lead in the rock for ever;" not characters traced out in the sand, to be washed out by the rising tide, or effaced by the wind, but in characters as permanent as the soul itself. The work of the Spirit in the hearts of the redeemed is radical work, work that goes to the very bottom; nothing flimsy, nothing superficial, nothing which can be effaced and obliterated s

"No man is able to pluck them out of My Father’s hand." - JOHN 10:29 [KJV] Think, my soul, how eternally safe and secure must the church of Jesus be, thus kept by the mighty power of God, through faith, unto salvation! What shall unclasp the hands of Jehovah? Who shall wrest the weakest, the humblest, the poorest of Christ’s little ones from the holding of His omnipotency? Why then art thou, my soul, so frequently exercised with fears, and doubts, and misgivings? It is the Lord’s love that is the foundation of thy assurance, and not the strength of thy graces! His own free mercy, and not thy merit were the first causes of thy calling; and what is it now, in thy present preservation, but the same which holds thee up and carries thee through every difficulty? "Yea, He loved the people; all His saints are in Thy hands" [ D EUTERONOMY 33:3 ] . Precious Lord Jesus! It is enough. How shall a child of Thine perish when secured by such almighty support? Oh