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

" Is it true?" -Daniel 3:14 [KJV] Note: read all of ch. 3 A question, this from a potent monarch, backed with a dreadful threatening: enough to have put Shadrach, Meshach, and Abed-nego to the stand. Their answer must provoke their God, or their king. But did they hesitate a moment? were they at all in doubtful suspense? No: they had faith in their Lord; and they boldly replied, “O king, we are not careful to answer thee in this matter.”   Our cause lies before our God. We are not left to ourselves. Our present life, our immortal soul, is in His hands. If you command us into the fiery furnace, our God will be with us. We shall be safe: He will deliver us. Either our bodies that we have shall not be burnt; or, if they are, the burning furnace shall be only a fiery chariot, to convey our souls to heaven and glory.  See the power of faith. According as they believed, so it was. The Son of God was with them: the fire could not hurt them. Hence, consider,  (1st.) ...

"Wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together.” -Matthew 24:28 [KJV] My soul! these are the words of Jesus, none of which should be suffered to fall to the ground. No doubt much instruction is contained in this passage. An eagle is a bird of prey: and Job saith, that the eagle hasteneth to the prey as the swift ships, see Job 9:26 . In all birds of prey there is great sagacity, a vast quickness of scent to smell their proper food afar off; and thus natural instinct, added to a rapacious appetite, compel those creatures to fly swift to their prey, and to devour the carcase. Is there nothing in all this that suits thee, my soul? Oh yes: If Jesus hath given thee a real principle of life in Himself, which becomes a spiritual quickening from day to day, and from one hour to another, thy hungering and thirsting for Jesus will be as earnest and as importunate as the instinct of nature in those birds for daily food. Pause, my soul, and say— is it s...

"Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when He shall appear, we shall be like Him; for we shall see Him as He is ." -I John 3:2 [KJV] What Christ is to the Church, what the Church is to Christ, can never be really known till time gives place to eternity, faith to sight, and hope to enjoyment. Nor even then, however beyond all present conception the powers and faculties of the glorified souls and bodies of the saints may be expanded, however conformed to the glorious image of Christ, or however ravished with the discoveries of His glory and the sight of Him as He is in one unclouded day,—no, not even then, will the utmost stretch of creature love, or highest refinement of creature intellect, wholly embrace or fully comprehend that love of Christ, which, as in time so in eternity, "passeth knowledge," as being in itself essentially incomprehensible, because infinite and divine. Who can calcu...

" Let’s read the word of God, and let’s be honest in our appraisal of the word of God. Let’s let God’s word sit in judgment on our doctrine instead of making our doctrine sit in judgment on God’s word. Most people know already what they believe and try to find the Scripture to prove it."   -preacher Henry Mahan, message entitled “Chosen to Salvation , ” 1974 A.D.

" He that is of God heareth God’s words." -John 8:47 [KJV] "...The one from the Mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage.” -Galatians 4:24 [KJV] Some of God’s children are kept under bondage by them. They are taught to look on themselves only as servants, not sons of God, because they dare not say they know their sins are forgiven. This is a foolish, unscriptural distinction. St. Paul expressly declares, that every believer is a son of God: “Ye are ALL the children of God, by faith in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:26.) Can a man be a servant of God without faith? No: “without faith, it is impossible to please God.” (Hebrews 11:6.) Every one who hath faith in the Son of God, is a child of God: his sins are as surely forgiven, as that Christ died for sinners: he shall never come into eternal condemnation for them, no more than if he had never committed them. This is God’s word (see John 5:24.)   As many as receive Christ, that is, believe on His name, have t...

"The glory which Thou gavest Me I have given them; that they may be one, even as We are one.” -John 17:22 [KJV] Those are sweet views of Jesus which point to our oneness and union with Him, by which alone we derive an interest in Him, and are made partakers both in His grace and glory. By virtue of this it is, that the glory the Father gave Jesus, as Mediator, all His people are interested in, and truly enjoy. For though like the heir of a kingdom, when an infant, the babe is unconscious of his dignity, yet is not the less entitled to his high birth and rank: so the seed of Jesus, while in this childhood of existence, though they do not live up to their high privileges through the weakness of their faith, yet their claim in Jesus is not the less. Jesus hath given them the glory of being brought within the covenant, the glory of redemption, the glory of the Holy Ghost's gifts and influences; and, in short, all the glory which a state of grace implies, and which is...

"But of Him are ye in Christ Jesus, Who of God is made unto us wisdom, and righteousness, and sanctification, and redemption: that, according as it is written, He that glorieth, let him glory in the Lord." -I Corinthians 1:30, 31 [KJV] Wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption . God has made Christ all these to His people. He has set Him up as their eternal Head, made Him the Bridegroom of their souls, that out of His fulness they may all receive. Then, just in proportion as they learn these two lessons— what they are, and what He is —they receive Him into their hearts actually what He is to them in the purpose of God. Am I a fool? Do I feel it and know it? Have I had painful experience of it, so that all my creature wisdom is turned into one mass of foolishness? Do I catch by the eye of faith a view of the risen Mediator, "Immanuel, God with us," and see what He is made of God to us? The moment my eye sees Him as "wisdom , " th...