ery. I touched the machinery. I was absorbingly interested in the processes. But I ate no bread! And I may be as deeply interested in the means of grace. I may be familiar with all “the ins and outs” of ecclesiastical machinery, and 1 may never handle nor taste “the bread of God.” Our religion is dead and bur densome until it becomes a personal rela tion and we have vital communion with Christ. “Thou, O Christ, art all I want.” We find everything in Him. Everything else is preliminary, preparatory, subordinate, and is to be in the long run dropped and forgotten. A ritual is .only a way to “the bread,” by no means essential, and very often undesirable. The heart can find the Lord with a look, with a cry; and it needs no obstruction of ritual or priest. But how pathetic! To be contented to potter about among the ritual and never to find “the bread” ! To be in the house and never to see the Hostl “Ye search the scriptures . . . and ye will not come to me.”—/. H. Jowett. — o — April 24— “I had fainted unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord” (Psa. 27:13), : Be not daunted though thou meetest with-many discouragements in thy jour ney. That man that is resolved for hea ven, if Satan cannot win him by flatteries, he will endeavor to weaken him by dis couragements, saying: “Thou art a sin ner thou hast broken God’s law; thou; art not elected; thou comest too late; the day of grace is passed; God doth not care for thee; thy heart is naught; thou art lazy”-—with a hundred other discourag ing Suggestions. And thus it was with David where he saith: “I had fainted, un less I had believed to see the lovingkind- ness of the Lord in the land'df the liv ing.” As if he should say: “The devil did so rage and my heart was so base that, had I judged according to my own sense and feeling, I had been absolutely dis tracted ; but I trusted to Christ in the promise, and looked that God would be as good as His promise in having mercy upon me, an unworthy sinner; and this is that which encouraged me, and kept me from fainting.” And this must thou do when Satan or the law or thy own con science do go about to dishearten thee, either by the greatness of thy sins, the wickedness of thy heart, or the tedious ness of the way. - Then thou must en courage thyself with the freenesS of the promises, the tender-heartedness of Christ,' the merits of His blood, and the freeness of His invitations. Therefore I say, take heart in thy journey, and faint not. —John Bunyan. •— o — April 25— “That ye might be filled with all the fulness of God” (Eph. 3:19). Among all the great sayings in this prayer, this is the greatest. To be filled with God is a great thing; to be filled with (unto) the fullness of God is great er ; to be filled with (unto) all the full ness of God is greatest of all. This utter ly bewilders the senses and confounds the understanding by leading us at once to consider the immensity of God, the in finity of His attributes, and the absolute perfection of each. But there must be a sense in which even this wonderful .
instruments of unrighteousness.” Bishop Westcott points out that the tenses of the words translated “yield” in this verse are not the same in both case$. The yielding to temptation there refers to successive acts of sin, by- which sin obtains mastery oyer a man; whereal, in the second word, “yield yourselves unto God,” it is one act of supreme self-surrender which carries all the rest with it. That is a distinction of very great importance. The word “in strument” is more accurately translated “arms” or “weapons.” It means ^furnish ing military weapons for aggressive pur poses. “Neither yield ye your' members as weapons of unrighteousness' unto sin.” What does it mean? It means this—there are Christian men and women yielding the members of their bodies to Satan to enable him to fight the Lord Jesus and keep back His, kingdom in this world. A great'deal of the devil’s work is being done by Christian people who aré giving him, though temporarily, the use of the members of their bodies. Paul says, by one act of supreme self-sacrifice yield yourselves to God; let the Lord Jesus have your lips and control them. Don’t yield them for a moment to the devil, but; yield them to the Lord, and let Him usé:■ them until the moment He calls you home. • —-Charles Inwood. — 0 — April 22— “He which hath begun a good work in you, will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ” (Phil. 1:6). He is not as one who begins to build, without having counted the cost. No sculptor: begins to execute a work with out having ascertained the impracticable nature of his material. These are the shameful mistakes of men. God is not a workman that will need to be ashamed. He has called together a goodly company of the nobility of heaven to look on, while He brings a holy creature out of your unholy nature. Will He lay down His im plements and say, “I miscalculated” ? They that know that a good work has been be gun in them are entitled to entertain an unwavering confidence that it will proceed until the day of Christ, when the believer shall be présented unblemished, spotless, perfect, before thé throne. It proceeds until that day. It is not begun, relinquish ed, begun again, and again relinguished, but is performed until the day of Christ So you have not to go to the past to know if a good work has been begun; it exists within you now. The work goes on. God is busy with you and in you whiie you live. From your first perception of Christ crucified to your pre sentation before the Lord of glory, you are wrought upon by the creative power of God. “Subservient to Thy daily praise Our daily toil shall be ; So may our works, in Thee begun, Be furthered, Lord, by Thee.” —George Bowen. — o — April 23— “Jesus said unto them, I am the bread o f life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger” (John 6:35). Our life’s bread is a Person. We may have much to do with Christianity and nothing to do with Christ. The other day I was in a great and wonderful bak
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