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

"Pilate released...Barabbas unto them, and delivered Jesus, when he had scourged Him, to be crucified" (Mark 15:15) . The guilty is set free and the innocent is put to death. The great sinner is delivered and the sinless one remains bound. Barabbas is spared, and Christ is crucified. This is the manner in which God justifies the ungodly. He does it because Christ has paid what they owe. He has suffered in their place, the just for the unjust. They deserve punishment, but a mighty substitute has suffered for them. They deserved eternal death, but a glorious surety has died for them. We are all by nature in the position of Barabbas. We are all guilty, wicked, and worthy of condemnation, but "when we were without hope" Christ the innocent died for the ungodly and now God for Christ's sake can be just, and yet "Justifier of him which believeth in Jesus." May we never rest until we can say by faith, "Christ is mine, I deserve hell, but Christ has die...

  It Is Finished! by D.G. Miles McKee   Here is the greatest declaration ever heard in human history … “It is Finished.” -John 19:30 These are our Saviours dying words and what powerfully important words they are.   It is reported that when Queen Elizabeth I of England lay dying she said, “ My God, my God it is over.  I have come to the end ! In her wardrobe, she had 2,000 costly dresses and gowns yet she called out, “All my possessions for just one more day.”   Pathetic words of a dying Queen!  How wonderful then, by contrast, are the words of the dying Savior who declares from the cross—"IT IS FINISHED!”  Salvation has been completed, accomplished and perfected. Notice, there is not a hint of worry, anxiety or despair from the Master.  How unlike the words of the dying English Queen who says, “My God My God it is over, I have come to the end.”   See how Christ’s words “It is Finished”, are filled with glorious victory. They mean, ‘It i...

" One day, as I was passing into the field, suddenly this sentence fell upon my soul: ‘Thy righteousness is in heaven.’ And I thought that I could see Jesus Christ at God’s right hand. Yes, there indeed was my righteousness, so that wherever I was, or whatever I was doing, God could not say about me that I did not have righteousness, for it was standing there before Him. I also saw that it was not my good feelings that made my righteousness better, and that my bad feelings did not make my righteousness worse, for my righteousness was Jesus Christ Himself, ‘the same yesterday, and today, and forever,’ Hebrews 13:8. Now, indeed, the chains fell off my legs, and I was loosened from my afflictions and irons. My temptations also fled away so that from that time forward those dreadful Scriptures terrified me no more. Now I went home rejoicing because of the grace and love of God, and went to my Bible to look up where the verse was found that said, ‘Thy righteousness is in heaven.’ Bu...

"So then with the mind I myself serve the law of God; but with the flesh the law of sin." -Romans 7:25 [KJV] Is this thy language, my soul? Hast thou learnt with Paul, with Job, with Isaiah, and all the faithful gone before, to loathe thyself in thine own sight? Dost thou groan, being burdened with a body of sin which drags down the soul? Pause over this view of human nature. In the first place - think, my soul, what humbling thoughts such a state of corruption ought to induce. Though the mind be regenerated, though with the mind the believer serves the law of God, delights in the law of God, loves the law, and would make it the subject of devout meditation all the day; yet such is the body of sin, the flesh with its affections, and appetites, and desires, that it draws away the attention, imperiously, puts in its claims, and rises up in rebellion continually.       And are the souls of God's children thus exercised, thus afflicted, in the struggles between the different...

  Friends, flee today to Christ JESUS, "The LORD our righteousness!" Cheers... GOD tells us that His people are ACCEPTED IN CHRIST (Ephesians 1:6) . If a person is without Christ, then he has nothing that God will accept! God tells us that NO MAN CAN COME unto the Father but by Christ; therefore, if a person is without Christ, he has no ground upon which he can approach God. Christ said, "I am the way, the truth, and the life." If He is THE WAY, there is no other way; if He is THE TRUTH, everything else is a lie; and if He is THE LIFE, everything apart from Him is death. Those who HAVE CHRIST have His blood for pardon, His righteousness for justification, His fullness for every need, His strength to support us, His promises to cheer us, His grace to keep us, and His power to present us faultless before the presence of His glory with exceeding joy. -preacher William Gadsby (1733 - 1844 A.D.)

"The precious ointment upon the head, that ran down upon the beard, even Aaron's beard: that went down to the skirts of his garments." -Psalm 133:2 [KJV]   My soul, behold, in the anointing here set forth of the Jewish high priest, a type of His anointing who is a Priest for ever, and a Priest upon His throne; and while looking at Aaron, say, as the Lord Jesus did upon another occasion concerning Solomon, "A greater than Aaron is here." It is sweet, very sweet, and very profitable, to behold the old church shadowing forth the new, and the law ministering to the gospel. Yes, blessed Jesus, I behold in Aaron, and in the precious ointment poured forth upon his head, thus running down to the skirts of his garments, the beautiful representation of that fulness of the Spirit, which was poured out upon Thee without measure; that from Thee the communication might flow down to the poorest, the humblest, the lowest of Thy members, even to the very skirts of Thy clothing...

  "For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator. For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth."  -Hebrews 9:16, 17 [KJV]   Behold, my soul, how graciously the Holy Ghost hath here represented the necessity of Jesus's death, in order that the testament, or will, He left behind Him, might have the intended effect; and all the benefits and blessings He bequeathed in it to His people, might be fully paid and made over to them for their present peace and everlasting happiness. Now, my soul, mark down, for this day's special meditation, the many precious things here contained.       Observe how very accommodating the Holy Ghost is to explain to thee divine things, by the similitude of human transactions. As a man makes his will, so Jesus made His. As what a man gives is altogether a free and voluntary act, so Jesus was not constrained by what He gave in His b...

"The trumpet of the jubilee." -Leviticus 25:9 [KJV]   My soul, pause over the subject of the jubilee trumpet; for surely much of gospel was proclaimed by it. It should seem that there were four distinct and special sounds of the trumpet in the camp of Israel. The trumpet of memorials, so called, (Leviticus 23:24) was blown on the occasion of the new moon, calling the people to the joyful assembly, Psalm 81:3. There was also the fast trumpet of which the prophet speaks, Joel 2:1. Besides these, the war trumpet gave a certain sound to prepare to battle (1 Cor. 14:8). And this of the jubilee, which differed from all.       And although the jubilee trumpet was never heard but once in fifty years, yet so sweet and so distinguishing was the sound, that no poor captive among the servants in the camp of Israel, was at a moment's loss to understand its gracious meaning. Say, my soul, is not the gospel sound, when first heard by the ear of faith, precisely the same? When pard...

"Thy lips, O My spouse, drop as the honeycomb." -Song of Solomon 4:11 [KJV]    While Jesus is so precious to His people, that they seek Him in every thing that is lovely, and indeed can discover nothing to be lovely until they have found Jesus in it, what an endearment is it to the soul of a believer, when he discovers Jesus looking upon him, eyeing him, and even commending Jesus's own graces, which He hath imparted to the soul, brought out into exercises again by the influences of His own Holy Spirit. My soul, canst thou really be led to believe that Jesus is speaking to His church, to His fair one, His spouse, to every individual soul of His redeemed and regenerated ones, in those sweet words of the song? Doth Jesus, the Son of God, call thee His spouse; and doth He say, thy lips drop as the honeycomb?  Pause, my soul, and ponder over these gracious words of thy God. By thy lips, no doubt, Jesus means thy words; of which Solomon saith "pleasant words are as an hon...

  Weekend Gospel message to follow for All Hands   (26-28MAR21) Heads-Up --- Please find enclosed encouragement in   SO GREAT SALVATION   by the perfect and finished work of our Lord Jesus Christ in saving poor, needy and wretched sinners by His sovereign free grace - God's unmerited favor - from  our  sins and from Hell: LOOK TO CHRIST "Looking unto Jesus the author and finisher of our faith; who for the joy that was set before Him endured the cross, despising the shame, and is set down at the right hand of the throne of God" (Hebrews 12:2) . My friend, salvation is in "looking unto Jesus." It is not in looking unto baptism, looking unto morality, looking unto church membership, looking unto keeping the commandments, looking unto living by the golden rule, or looking unto coming to church. It is looking unto Jesus as Prophet, Priest and King. It is looking unto Him alone. It is not in looking unto your humility or obedience, but in looking unto Him who "hu...