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2016-09-04

The Lord is faithful, who shall establish you, and guard you from evil" (2 Thess. 3:3, R.V.).

When once we see and accept His purpose for our lives to the extent that it becomes our will also, the details of His process cease to matter. “Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him” (Job. 13:15). “

The one purpose our Father has in view, in all His ways, is to conform us to the image of His Son. This may explain our perplexities as to the past; it will govern our behaviour in the present; it is to be our guide in the future. The chief concern of our Lord is not to instruct us about a multitude of details, not to explain to us the reason for the trials which we are called to pass through. He is working out everything to serve His one supreme aim in manifesting the character of His Son in His saints.” -H.F.

“The God-given experiences of the Spirit’s working within many a time passes away, and leaves the believer apparently dull and dead. This is only until the double lesson has been fully learned: (1) that a living faith can rejoice in the Living God, even when all feeling and experience appear to contradict the truth (Rom. 8:28, 29); and (2) that the Divine life only predominates as the life of the old man is held in the place of death, inoperative (Rom. 6:11a). The life of the Lord Jesus is revealed as His death works in us (2 Cor. 4:11, 12), and as in weakness and nothingness we look to Him (2 Cor. 3:18).” -A.M.

“While our Father is dealing with someone in discipline, when He is applying the Cross in a life, be careful how you sympathize with him. You may be taking sides with him against God. By such sympathy, you may, indeed, draw him away from the work of the Cross.” “

For we who live are always delivered unto death for Jesus’ sake, that the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh” (2 Cor. 4:11)

The Prisoner of Christ

I, Paul, the prisoner of Christ Jesus for you.... (Ephesians 3:1)

The measure of approximation to the fullness of the revelation has always been accompanied by a relative cost. Every instrument of the testimony has been laid under suspicion and reproach in a measure commensurate with the degree of value to the Lord, and this has meant that, humanly, they were limited to that extent. Many have withdrawn, fallen away, held aloof, doubted, feared, and questioned. But as Paul could say "My tribulations for you, which are your glory" (Eph. 3:13), or "The prisoner of Christ Jesus in behalf of you Gentiles" (Eph. 3:1), so the measure of limitation in the Lord is the measure of enrichment in His people. The fuller the revelation, the fewer those who apprehend, or the greater the number of those who stand aloof. Revelation only comes through suffering and limitation, and to have it experimentally means sharing the cost in some way. But this is God's way of securing for Himself a spiritual seed plot....

All this may apply to individual lives in relation to the Lord's testimony. There may often be a chafing against limitation, confinement, and a restless hankering after what we would call something wider or less restricted. If the Lord has willed us to the place where we are, our acceptance of it in faith may prove that it becomes a far bigger thing than any human reckoning can judge. I wonder if Paul had any idea that his prison meant his continuous expansion of value to the Lord Jesus through nineteen hundred years? What applies to individuals also applies to corporate bodies, assemblies, or companies of the Lord's people scattered in the earth but one in their fellowship in relation to the Lord's full testimony. May the Lord be graciously pleased to cause the merely human aspect of prison walls to fall away, and give the realization that, far from being limited by men and circumstances, it is imprisonment in the Lord, and this means that all ages and all realms are entered through that prison.

Wait on the Lord; be of good courage, and He shall strengthen your heart.

Have you not known? Have you not heard? The everlasting God, the Lord, the Creator of the ends of the earth, neither faints nor is weary … He gives power to the weak, and to those who have no might He increases strength. § Fear not, for I am with you; be not dismayed, for I am your God. I will strengthen you, yes, I will help you, I will uphold you with My righteous right hand. § You have been a strength to the poor, a strength to the needy in his distress, a refuge from the storm, a shade from the heat; for the blast of the terrible ones is as a storm against the wall.

The testing of your faith produces patience. But let patience have its perfect work, that you may be perfect and complete, lacking nothing. § Do not cast away your confidence, which has great reward. For you have need of endurance, so that after you have done the will of God, you may receive the promise. 

Ps. 27:14;  Isa. 40:28,29;   Isa. 41:10;   Isa. 25:4;  James 1:3,4;  Heb. 10:35,36

He makes me to lie down in green pastures.

The wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest … “There is no peace,” says my God, “for the wicked.”

Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. § Rest in the Lord. § He who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works.

Do not be carried about with various and strange doctrines. For it is good that the heart be established by grace. § We should no longer be children, tossed to and fro and carried about with every wind of doctrine, by the trickery of men, in the cunning craftiness of deceitful plotting, but, speaking the truth in love, may grow up in all things into Him who is the head—Christ.

I sat down in his shade with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste. He brought me to the banqueting house, and his banner over me was love.

Ps. 23:2;  Isa. 57:20,21;  Matt. 11:28;  Ps. 37:7;  Heb. 4:10;  Heb. 13:9;  Eph. 4:14,15;  Song 2:3,4

Eternal Son and Unique Man - Perfect MAN Eternal SON (16)

Reconciled to God