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

  A refuge for sinners the Gospel makes known, 'Tis found in the merits of Jesus alone; The weary, the tempted, the burdened of sin Are never excluded from entering in. This refuge for sinners God's love did ordain In Jesus, the Lamb, from eternity slain; In Christ the Redeemer Who lived and Who died, God's law and His justice are now satisfied. Should conscience accuse us, as often it may, The blood of our Saviour has put sin away; In Jesus, our Surety, the sinner can view A city of refuge and righteousness too. -Tune:  How Firm A Foundation

  I once read a statement by a group that said, “We operate from the belief that everyone is essentially good.” I thought this a bit contradictory since it was given in a statement of policy concerning dealing with problems between individuals! If all people are “essentially good,” then why all the problems among them in the world: the wars, the crime, the conflicts between individuals, the mistrust and on and on? But what is worse, this same principle is at the core of most all religious beliefs. Yet the word of truth is clear. God who knows man far better than we know ourselves says, “There is none that doeth good, no, not one...” (Romans 3:12) . The “good heart” that most claim to have is the seat of all bad, all evil according to God. “The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked: who can know it?” (Jer emiah 17:9) . The hearts of men are “desperately wicked” and most deceitful, deceiving us into imagining we are essentially good. Christ said, “For out of...

  "And floods upon the dry ground." -Isaiah 44:3 [KJV] How often does the soul, born and taught of God, feel that it is this "dry ground!" It would fain be fruitful in every good word and work; it would be adorned with every grace of the Spirit within, and with every good and godly fruit without. Let no one think that the child of God is careless or indifferent either as to inward or outward fruit. There is nothing too holy, too heavenly, too spiritual, or too gracious which the child of grace would not desire inwardly to experience and outwardly produce.   But he feels that he cannot by any exertion of his own produce this fruitfulness after which he sighs. As well might a barren field convert itself into a fruitful garden without being tilled by human hand or without rain from the sky, as a soul that feels and knows its own barrenness produce by its own exertions a crop of the fruits of righteousness.   But the Lord that knows the desire of the heart, and...