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

“And we desire that every one of you do shew the same diligence to the full assurance of hope unto the end .”   -Hebrews 6:11  [KJV] The assurance of hope is true and lasting assurance that comes from a concentrated, determined, intense, passionate looking by faith to the Lord Jesus Christ as Surety of our salvation.  It is also called the “full assurance of faith”  (Hebrews 10:22) as the believer sees and believes the way into “the holiest , ”  the very presence of God Himself, “by the blood of Jesus”  (Hebrews 10:19).   The “blood of Jesus”   is “the righteousness of God”  (Romans 3:21-26) freely imputed to His people and which they all without exception receive in their minds and hearts by God-given faith in the Lord Jesus Christ (Romans 10:9-10). This is the ground of our salvation and the ground of our assurance of salvation.  Our hope is in Christ Jesus alone. We a...

  “I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help. My help cometh from the LORD, which made heaven and earth.”   -Psalm 121:1-2 [KJV]   Almighty God’s Word tells us to look up to Him alone for salvation as He reveals Himself in the glorious Person and finished work of Christ (Isaiah 45:21-25). It also tells us that we can look up to Him alone for help in time of need. When we, as children of God, experience trouble in this world, and we often do, our real help can only come from the Lord.  Our brother Job said, “Man that is born of a woman is of few days, and full of trouble”  (Job 14:1). Our Lord JESUS Christ told us that “...in the world ye shall have tribulation: but be of good cheer; I have overcome the world”  (John 16:33). These troubles come from without and from within, but we know that no trouble can separate us from the love of God in Christ (Romans 8:35-39)...

" Now the just shall live by faith." -Hebrews 10:38 [KJV] Then they will highly prize the word of God. “For by that faith cometh” (see Romans 10:17.) Prophets and apostles, Old Testament saints and New Testament believers speak by one and the same Spirit, one and the same language, of one and the same life. “The just shall live by his faith,” says Habakkuk 2:4. Mind, It is not said, the just, or the justified sinner, shall live for his faith. This would be to substitute faith in the room of its blessed object, Jesus Who saith, “Because I live, ye shall live also " (John 14:19.)   Nor is it said, he shall live upon his faith. We are too apt to look more to, and live more upon, what we think faith, which is rather the feelings of sense, than upon Christ, the object of faith. It is said of Esau, “By thy sword shalt thou live” (Genesis 27:40.) To have lived upon his sword, would have been hard food indeed. But he lived upon the precious morsels his swor...