The Shadow Of The Cross

Read : John 12 : 27-36
But for this purpose I came to this hour. Father, glorify your name. - John 12 : 27-28

The Lord Jesus Christ was born into this world to die for our sin. The specter of the cross loomed before Him. He lived in its shadow, knowing that being about His Father's business (Lk. 2:49) would lead Him eventually to drink the bitter cup of divine wrath (22:42).

Holman Hunt depicted the certainty of Christ's death in a painting titled The Shadow of Death. It shows Jesus standing beside His workbench in a carpenter's shop in Nazareth. He has laid down His saw and is lifting His eyes to heaven. He stretches, raising His arms to release the tension in His muscles. The evening sun, coming in through the open door, casts His shadow on the wall behind Him in the form of a cross. The tool rack runs parallel to the shadow of His outstretched arms. He looks as if He has been crucified. Mary kneels on the floor, her hands positioned on a chest containing the precious gifts of the wise men. She seems shocked by the shadow of her Son.

This painting expresses the central truth that Jesus Christ came to earth of take away "the sin of the world" (Jn. 1:29). He could do that only through bearing our sin "in His own body on the tree" (1 Peter 2:24). We can rejoice because Jesus chose to live under the shadow of the cross. - Dave Egner

Forbid it, Lord, that I should boast,
Save in the death of Christ, my God
All the vain things that charm me most -
I sacrifice them to His blood. - Watts

The Nail- Pierced Hands Of Jesus Reveal The Love-Filled Heart Of God. 

Guilty!

Read : Romans 3 : 9-24
For all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. - Romans 3:23

A preacher asked a group of young people what they must do before obtaining forgiveness. One young man replied, "Sin". That makes us all candidates for forgiveness.

Dr. Karl Menninger told about a man standing on a corner in Chicago. Said Menninger, "He would point to one and then another and intone loudly the single word, 'Guilty'! Then without a change of expression, he would assume a stiff stance for a few minutes and do the same thing again. One to whom he pointed turned turned to a companion and said, 'But how did he know?' That man could have pointed to any one of us" (Fingertip Facts File).

The Bible states clearly that "all have sinned." Everyone is guilty - by birth and by choice. All are therefore under condemnation of death, both physical (separation of the soul from the body) and spiritual (separation of the soul from God). The charge of guilty can be removed, however, by faith in the Lord Jesus. He died on the cross to pay the penalty our sin demanded; and because He was the perfect Son of God, God grants forgiveness on the basis of His atoning death.

Anyone who has not accepted Jesus can do so today. His offer of free salvation still stands. He will change your verdict from "guilty" to "justified" (Rom. 5:1) - Richard De Haan

Just as I am, and waiting not
To rid my soul of one dark blot,
To Thee whose blood can cleanse each spot,
O Lamb of God, I come! I come! - Elliott

No One Is So Good That He Can Save Himself And No One Is So Bad That God Cannot Save Him. 

The Great Reverse

Read : Psalm : 37: 27-40
Wait on the Lord, and keep His way, and He shall exalt you to inherit the land. - Psalm 37 : 34

As a rule, it is wrong to take from one person and give to another. Yet when the proper authority takes from a criminal to give to an orphan, it's a different story. Such was the case when the wife of Peruvian President Alan Garcia ordered that a mansion confiscated from a cocaine dealer be converted into an orphanage. The house known as "Villa Coca" became a haven for homeless children.

God did something like this when He guided the children of Israel to Canaan, the Promised Land. The Lord used the Israelites to judge the idol-worshiping residents of Canaan by driving them out of their land. God gave His people cities and homes they hadn't built, wells they hadn't dug, and vineyards they hadn't planted. He took from His enemies to give to His people, just as He had promised (Dt. 6: 10-11).
As the real owner of heaven and earth, the Lord assures us that He has the authority and the power to take from the proud and to give to the humble. It's true, the Lord may seem blind to the actions of those who have gained great wealth by vice and violence. But according to Psalm 37, eternity will show the wisdom of those who wait on the Lord, They will see the great reverse. - Mart De Haan

That great reverse on judgement day
Will finally make life's values clear;
We'll know if we are rich or poor
By what on earth we held most dear. - D. De Haan

And the end of life, we'll find that the only things we've lost were those we tried to keep.

Anticipation Overcomes Fear

Read : Joshua 3
You have not passed this way before. - Joshua 3:4


When I was a boy, the flame of adventure burned brightly in my soul, filling my life with anticipation. I loved to read stories about pioneers who ventured into the unknown, and I still remember these words of Rudyard Kipling :

There is no sense in going further - it's the edge of civilization,
So they said, and I believed it -
Till a voice, as bad as conscience, rang interminable changes
On one everlasting whisper day and night repeated -
Something hidden. Go and find it.
Go and look behind the Ranges,
Lost and waiting for you. Go!

Although I still like to try new things, I've lost some of my adventurous spirit as I've grown older, and I find myself feeling a bit uneasy as I draw closer to retirement, old age, and death. It's natural to feel a mixture of fear and anticipation as we face the unknown. But as I trust God and keep walking with Him, I find that fear diminishes and my longing for heaven grows stronger.

The Israelites undoubtedly felt both uneasiness and eagerness as they prepared to enter the Promised Land. Knowing this, Joshua told them to follow the ark, the symbol of God's presence. The people leading the column were to stay far enough behind the ark so that those in the rear could see it. By trusting God and obeying Him, their fear dissolved and their sense of anticipation grew stronger. And it still works that way today. - Herb Vander Lugt




Faith Keeps The Sails Of Life Filled With The Breath Of Heaven.

Your Hand In His

Read : Psalm 139:1-12
Your right hand shall lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me. - Psalm 139:10

In a Christmas Address to the people of the British Empire in 1939, King George VI spoke of his faith in God's leading. World War II had begun, and Great Britain faced the onslaughts of Hitler's barrage. The King concluded his remarks with lines written by Minnie Louise Haskins some 30 years earlier : "And I said to the man who stood at the gate of the year : 'Give me a light that I may tread safely into the unknown'. And he replied: 'Go out into the darkness and put your hand into the Hand of God. That shall be to you better thatn light and safer than a known way.' "

Like Great Britain in 1939, each of us faces a future whose trademark is change, perhaps with foreboding circumstances. But we have Someone to guide us even in the darkest night. That's why the psalmist could say, "Your hand shall lead me, and Your right hand shall hold me."

Life holds no surprises for God. No path is unknown to Him - no circumstances unsettling. Because the future is perfectly clear to our Father, Christians have the full assurance that we can follow where God leads, whether the way is marked by calm or storm.

We can confidently put our hand in God's. He forgives the past, controls the present, holds the future. - Paul Van Gorder

I may not always understand
The way that You will lead,
But, Lord, in faith I'll clasp Your hand
And trust You for each need. - Dean

Those who see God's hand in everything can best leave everything in God's hand. 

Don't Discard - Restore

Read : Galatians 6 : 1-5
If a man is overtaken in any trespass, you who are spiritual restore such a one. - Galatians 6:1

A few years ago, a disturbed man rushed madly through the Rijks Museum in Amsterdam until he reached Rembrandt's famous painting Nightwatch. Then he took out a knife and slashed it repeatedly. A short time later, a distraught, hostile man slipped into St. Peter's Cathedral in Rome and smashed Michelangelo's beautiful sculpture. The Pieta. Did the museum officials throw the damaged works out and forget about them? Absolutely not. Using the best experts and all the available technology, they made every effort to restore the treasures.

Christians ought to have the same attitude toward believers, whose testimony has been damaged by sin.When one of God's children falls into sin, our first thought should be to restore, not to condemn. Tenderly and compassionately we must pray and work to bring that one back to spiritual wholeness and fellowship within the body of Christ. The word restore in Galatians 6:1 is the same word translated mend in Matthew 4:21, where we read that James and John were mending their nets. It means "to make thoroughly fit. "

Condemning is easier than restoring. In disgust we may want to turn our backs on a sinning Christian. But the scriptural pattern is not to discard but to restore. - Dave Egner

Down in the human heart, crushed by the tempter,
Feelings lie buried that grace can restore;
Touched by a loving heart, wakened by kindness,
Chords that are broken will vibrate once more. - Crosby

We can't expect others to see eye to eye with us if we look down on them.

Whom Do You Worship?

Read : Revelation 1: 1-8
[Jesus] washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us kings. - Revelation 1:5-6

A gifted athlete sent to prison for using and selling illegal drugs made me sad. His friends said, "What a shame! just think of what he could be enjoying if he had kept clean!"

This man's failure to fulfill his potential pictures of the whole human race. God made us in His image to obey Him, enjoy fellowship with Him, and rule over the earth for His glory, but we don't obey Him as we should, enjoy Him as we ought, or rule over planet earth as we could. Immorality, crime, famine, conflict, and potential nuclear holocaust continually remind us of our failure to live up to the potential the Lord built into us.

But that's not the whole story. God has provided a way to life each of us fro our moral failure and elevate us to spiritual fulfillment. He became a member of the human family in the person of Jesus Christ, who lived a perfect life, died on the cross as our substitute, and rose from the grave. Now he forgives, accepts, and restores all who believe on Him. Believers are now "kings", destined to rule with Christ (Rev 1: 5-6).

When we suffer a shattering defeat, we don't have to stay down. The gospel is good news. Through faith in Jesus, God gives us new life and begins to lift us from out failure to the fulfillment of His purpose for us. - Herb Vander Lugt

O precious bride, espoused to One
Who loved you so He'd even die,
If you would worship Him alone,
All other "christs" you must deny. - D. De Haan



Salvation makes useful saints out of useless sinners.

"Enterprise Zones"

Read : Romans 6:1-18
Shall we continue in sin that grace may abound? Certainly not! - Romans 6: 1-2

Some Christians seem to give up trying to grow in difficult areas of their lives. They have suffered so many defeats that they think they will never make any progress. They react much like a city that stands idle while its blighted areas deteriorate.

But some cities are showing remarkable success in bringing new life and radical improvement to decayed sections. They label these areas "enterprise zones", a name that carries with it the idea of potential for vast upgrading through much time and effort. By looking at the problem through new eyes, they see it as an opportunity for constructive restoration rather than ongoing deterioration. This new attitude is bringing results.

Christians need a similar outlook. We too should begin to see our own areas of perennial failure as "enterprise zones", where focused prayer and concentrated effort can produce improvement. We need not live in spiritual defeat. No sin has the power to conquer us. Christ's death on the cross broke the stranglehold of sin, and it no longer has dominion over us (Rom 6:14).

When some sin has us in its destructive grasp, we should claim God's help, change our attitude about it, and turn our area of defeat into an "enterprise zone". - Dave Egner

The Savior can break sin's dominion
The victory He won long ago;
In Him there is freedom from bondage,
He's able to conquer the foe. - Smith

Don't let yesterday's failures hamper tomorrow's efforts. 

The Next Shot Is The Big One

Read : Philippians 3:12-16
Forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward..., I press toward the goal. - Philippians 3:13-14

I don't play enough to perfect my swing or to master all the shots. In every round, I make mistakes. A drive goes astray. An iron shot splashes into the creek. A putt breaks left when I was sure it would break right.

So I like these words from The Tumult and the Shouting by Grantland Rice: "Because golf expresses the flaws of the human swing - a basically simple maneuver - it causes more self-torture than any game short of Russian roulette. The quicker the average golfer can forget the shot he has dubbed or knocked off line - and concentrate on the next shot - the sooner he begins to improve and enjoy golf. Little good comes from brooding about the mistakes we've made." Rice then wrote, "The next shot, in golf or in life, is the big one."

In Philippians 3, the apostle Paul gave essentially the same advice. He said that the key to forward movement in the Christian life is to set our eyes on the goal and keep looking ahead. When we look back to our past sins or shortcomings, we open the door to discouragement.

When past sin gets us down, or when we get discouraged because of some failure, we can confess it to God, claim His forgiveness, and put it behind us for good. In the Christian life, as in golf, the next shot is the big one. - Dave Egner

When I have failed, I need You, Lord,
To teach this lesson clear :
If I but learn and try again,
Success is always near.  - Branon

We must never let defeat rob us of success.

Timely Tears

Read: Acts 20:16-31
I did not cease to warn everyone night and day with tears. - Acts 20:31

Some people think crying is a sign of weakness. But our Savior wept. And the apostle Paul was not afraid to mention his own tears when he wrote about his burden for people. Good servants of Jesus Christ will be like that - they will have tender, compassionate hearts. They will be so filled with love that those feelings will often splash over as tears.

One day D.L. Moody preached a moving sermon about the compassion of Christ. When a friend asked him how he had prepared such a message, he answered, "I got to thinking the other day about the compassion of Christ; so I took the Bible and began to read it over to find out what it said on the subject. I prayed over the texts as I went along until the thought of His infinite compassion overpowered me, and I could only lie on the floor of my study with my face in the open Bible and cry like a child."

As we stand in the shadow of the cross and let God's love in Christ flood our souls, our heard hearts will melt, and coldness will give way to warmth. If we allow the Holy Spirit to control us, He will produce in us a Christlike concern. Then his compassion for the unsaved will become ours. The love of Christ will cause us to reach out to others. And that caring attitude will be accompanied by timely tears. - Paul Van Gorder

Tears in my heart for those who pass by -
Not heeding the gospel - not ready to die;
May tears melt my heart, indifferent and cold,
Till many of these are brought into the fold.  - MacPetrie

Tears flow freely from the fountain of a love-filled heart. 

The Cure For Regret

Read: John 21:15-19
In those days, Peter stood up in the midst of the disciples. - Acts 1:15

Remorse deprives many Christians of the joy that should be theirs. A man in his middle years has withdrawn from the people in his church because he feels so bad about his past - a sin that broke up his home. an elderly woman needs counseling because she can't forget an affair she had more than 50 years ago. A young woman sees a psychiatrist because she can't forgive herself for having had an abortion.

If anyone ever had good reason for allowing the memory of a grievous sin to put him on the shelf, it was Peter. He had been such a coward, fleeing Gethsemane at Christ's arrest, and then denying three times that he knew the Lord. Later, he felt so bad that he wept bitterly. Yet he did not allow his remorse over past failures to make him ineffective in his service for Christ. He accepted the Lord's forgiveness, and he received new hope from Jesus' commission, "Feed my sheep". In Acts 1:15 we find him back in his role as the leader of the disciples. By taking Jesus' words of forgiveness to heart and by forgiving himself, he put the past under the blood of Christ.

When we confess our sin, we can leave it with Christ and forget it. Then we can move on and serve Him. We need never let remorse remove out joy. - Herb Vander Lugt

The vain regrets of yesterday
Have vanished through God's pardoning grace;
The guity fear has passed away,
And joy has come to take its place.  - Ackley

Christians should seek to erase from their memory the sins God has erased from their record. 

The Bounce Test

Read: Luke 22: 31-34
I have prayed for you, that your faith should not fail - Luke 22:32

With cranberries, it's the bounce that counts. While the quility of some fruits is judged by their firmness and color, the best cranberries are distinguished by their ability to "bounce like a golf ball."

Science Digest reports that freshly picked berries are processed by pouring them down a series of steplike boards. At each level, only those berries that bounce over an 8 to 10 inch barrier pass the quality test.

Christian face a "bounce test" too. The strength of their faith can be measured by their ability to bounce back after a fall. Although failure is painful, it offers an occassion to re-affirn our heart's devotion to Christ.

Jesus knew that the apostle Peter was about to trip over his self-confidence and zeal by denying Him. Yet the Lord saw beyond this devastating failure to the diciple's repentance  and restoration. When he assured Peter that He had prayed that his faith would not fail, He was saying, in effect, "Peter, you will bounce back after your fall."

If you've had a spiritual reversal, don't give up. Christ can restore you. You can be useful to Him again, even after a hard fall. It's the "bounce" of your faith and God's forgiveness that will enable you to go on. - Mart De Hann

Though oftentimes we stray from You
And disregard Your Word,
In tenderness You bring us back
Our gracious, loving Lord! - D, De Haan

Defeat isn't bitter unless we swallow it.

Compassionate Touch

Read : Mark 1:40-45
Jesus, moved with compassion, stretched out His hand, and touched him. - Mark 1:41

People who enjoy good health sometimes neglect the less fortunate, and sometimes they even treat them cruelly. When I was young, I saw a group of older boys teasing a retarded man. I have also observed people deliberately avoid someone who looks "different" or who has a physical handicap.

Jesus never responded that way. He was kind to afflicted people, and they thronged about Him. He took a blind man by the hand and led him away from the crowd before healing him. He touched the sick - even lepers. He stopped to expel demons from the possessed. I recently observed my sister-in-law's kindness to people most others ignore. Every week she spends a large part of a day
helping two aged shut-ins. She has also befriended a mentally impaired man who lives on her street. Almost everyday he stops at her home for a brief visit. From the smile on his face, we sensed the joy she brings in his life.

How we treat the less fortunate is one measure of our likeness to Jesus. Because they cannot give in return, we have a special opportunity to be truly unselfish. We should welcome every occassion to show Christlike compassion to those who receive so little but need so much. - Herb Vander Lugt

Oh lead me, Lord, that I may lead
The wandering and the wavering feet;
Oh feed me, Lord, that I may feed
The hungering ones with manna sweet. - Havergal 

A test of our Christian love is whether or not we help those who cannot help us in return.

What Brings The Most Glory?

Read : Mark 14: 32-38
Take this cup away from Me;nevertheless; not what I will, but what You will. - Mark 14:36

Many sincere believers in the Lord Jesus claim that sickness is never God's will for the Christian. Therefore we should pray for the restoration with a tenacity that refuses to take no for an answer. According to them, physical infirmity continues because we have become content with it. What we need, they say, is more faith and a rejection of the qualifier, "If it be Your will".

But consider Jesus' plea in the Garden of Gethsemane. Although His prayer focused on the awful ordeal He faced, not sickness, God's response to it clearly shows that His glory is not always best served through instant, miraculous deliverance. In His humanity, the Lord Jesus drew back from the awful prospect of pain and suffering, just as we would from cancer. And like Him, we have a right to ask that "this cup" be taken from us. Yet we must ask, what will glorify God the most? The Norwegian theologian Ole Hallesby said we should pray something like this : "Lord, if it will be Your glory, heal suddenly. If it will glorify You more, heal gradually; if it will glory You even more, may your servant remain sick awhile; and if it will glorify Your name still more, take him to Yourself in heaven" - Dennis De Haan

My prayer is a simple one, Father :
Whatever is best for me, do;
In sickness, in health I desire
What brings the most glory to You.   - Fasick