They journeyed from Marah, and came unto Elim: Num 33:9

  

Our Daily Homily





They journeyed from Marah, and came unto Elim: and in Him. Num 33:9 (R. V.)

In his enumeration of the halting places of Israel, Moses mentions Marah and Elim. In the case of the former, he does not dwell on the murmuring of the people over the bitter stream: but in the case of Elim, he loves to dilate on the twelve springs of water, and the three-score and ten palm trees, under which they pitched. 

Years of weary travel had not obliterated the memory of the refreshment afforded by those seventy palms.

We should remember the blessings of the past. - God has so made us that we soon forget pain; but memory is willing to keep the fresco-pictures of sunny scenes unobliterated upon the walls of her galleries. Thus we may encourage our faith and comfort our hearts, by musing on the hand of the Lord which has been upon us for good. 

You have had many hard tracks of desert sand to traverse; but never forget those three-score and ten palm trees. Let their gracious shade and fruit still refresh you. And remember that God will restore them, whenever needed. If not, you can always find your palm trees and wells in Himself.

God does not remember the sins of the past. - There is no word of their murmurings, either at Marah or Rephidim. It is thus that God deals with us. "I, even I, am He that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins." 

When God forgives, He forgets. He erases the record from His book, and deals with us as though no sin had been committed. When we get to heaven and study the way-book, we shall find all the deeds of love and self-denial carefully recorded, though we have forgotten them; and all the sins blotted out, though we remember them.

Nothing So Priceless As A Soul By Joe H. Hankins. From The Evangelist

Classic Christian Writings


"They that be wise shall shine as the brightness of the firmament; and they that turn many to righteousness as the stars for ever and ever" (Daniel 12:3). They that be wise shall shine more or less throughout eternity, but it is only the soul winner that God says "shall shine...as the stars for ever and ever."

What a statement this is for the eternal God to make! What a privilege is accorded to every Blood-bought child of the Lord! Surely this promise means that God has a reward in store for those who win souls. That is so glorious that human mind cannot conceive it.

Surely it conveys to us, too, something of the inestimable value that God places upon the human soul. There is nothing so priceless in all the universe. Jesus had this in mind when He said, "What is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?" (Matthew 16:26).

Other things are fleeting, but the soul is eternal. Every soul born into this world will outlive the stars. When they fall like ripened fruit in the autumn and go out like sparks from the welder’s torch, the soul will live on. When the last ashes of the material universe are scattered through limitless space, the soul will live to make the eternal tramp, tramp of the ages. The soul will live on in celestial joy beyond the power of tongue to tell, or pen to portray; or in torment, gruesome, incomparable, consuming, yet everlasting!

May God help you and me today to try to bring somebody to a saving knowledge of the Lord Jesus Christ!

As Men Who Wait For Their Lord By A. A. Ronshausen

As Men Who Wait For Their Lord 


The Lord’s message to the Laodicean church is a timely message for today’s Church. (See Revelation 3:14-22). Much of Christendom is in the Laodicean stage. It is Christ’s last call to the Church before He leaves the mercy seat for the judgment seat. Laodiceanism is a disease of the Church and not of the world. It is the subtlest sin of hell. It is religion – but it is the religion that Jesus hates.

It is the surrender of first love – cooling off from fervency to lukewarmness – profession without possession – a name to live and art dead (Rev. 2:1-5; 3:1). It is being neither hot nor cold in love or works – mediocre service – indifferent praying – contentment in spiritual barrenness – complacency in idleness – grudging in giving – reluctance in sacrificing – no martyr or witnessing spirit.

It is burdenless, passionless, spiritless, deceived people, doomed to judgment instead of rewards of the faithful, believing themselves rich and in need of nothing, not knowing they are miserable, poor and blind.

To them Jesus calls: "Be zealous and repent…. Buy of Me gold tried in the fire, that thou mayest be rich; and white raiment that thou mayest be clothed…and anoint thine eyes with eyesalve that thou mayest see" (Rev. 3:18-19).

Are You Ready?

Are you wise or foolish? (Read Matthew 25:1-13). Repent, and be zealous. Be filled with the Spirit. Love God supremely. Keep yourselves from idols. Flee Laodicean lukewarmness, or else, at His coming, He will spue you out of His mouth!

"Thanks For The Thorn" By George Matheson

"Thanks For The Thorn"
"There was given to me a thorn in the flesh" (2 Corinthians 12:7).
"There was given to me…" Can, then, the thorn be a gift from God? 

I am in the habit of seeing God’s gifts in the abundance of the things which my life possesses, and I call those things the dangers of life which diminish the sum of its abundance. But here there is a complete reversal of my thought; the abundance is the danger, and that which diminishes it is the gift.

Paul has been exalted above measure; he has been standing on the heights of prosperity, and summering in the sunshine of a cloudless day. The cloudlessness of the day is his greatest danger, and there is sent a mist over the sun. His spiritual life has been fragrant with the breath of flowers. The thorn is, for the time, God’s best gift to his soul; there is something protective in it. It has no fragrance, it has no beauty, but it yields one of the sweetest uses of adversity—it reminds a human spirit that it is, after all, only human.

My God, I have never thanked Thee for my thorn. I have thanked Thee a thousand times for my roses, but not once for my thorn. I have been looking forward to a world where I shall get compensation for my cross, but I have never thought of my cross as itself a present glory.

Thou, Divine Love, whose human path has been perfected through sufferings, teach me the glory of my cross, teach me the value of my thorn. Show me that I have climbed to Thee by the path of pain. Show me that my tears have made my rainbow. Reveal to me that my strength was the product of that hour when I wrestled until the breaking of the day. Then shall I know that my thorn was blessed by Thee, then shall I know that my cross was a gift from Thee, and I shall raise a monument to the hour of my sorrows, and the words which I shall write upon it will be these: "It was good for me to have been afflicted" (Psalm 119:71).


This meditation is taken from the author’s book, Moments on the Mount, now out of print. Reprinted from The Prairie Overcomer 10/76

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George Matheson

1842-1906

      George Matheson was a Scottish theologian and preacher.

      He was educated at the University of Glasgow, where he graduated first in classics, logic and philosophy. In his twentieth year he became totally blind, but he held to his resolve to enter the ministry, and gave himself to theological and historical study.

      However, he was academically gifted, and his sisters learned Latin, Greek, and Hebrew to help him study. He graduated from the University of Edinburgh (MA 1862), then became a minister in the Church of Scotland. He pastored in the resort town of Innelan for 18 years; due to his ability to memorize sermons and entire sections of the Bible, listeners were often unaware he was blind. In 1886, Matheson became pastor of St. Bernard's Church in Edinburgh, where he served 13 years. He spent the remaining years of his life in literary efforts.

Devotional	All Types       "When they saw the boldness of Peter and John...they took knowledge of them, that they had been with Jesus" (Acts 4:13). These two men drew one quality from the same source; they had both become bold from living with Jesus. Yet it was not the same kind of boldness. Peter and John were both courageous; yet the courage of Peter was as unlike the ...read
Hymn	Blind Matheson Penned Immortal Hymn       George Matheson was hurting. It was not physical pain that cut him, or regret for the blindness that had robbed him of sight by the time he was eighteen. Rather, it was anguish of spirit. It was on this day, June 6, 1882, the day of his sister's marriage. His family was staying overnight in Glasgow, Scotland, leaving him alone in the Manse (a pa ...read
Hymn	Gather Us in, Thou Love That Fillest All       Gather us in, Thou Love that fillest all; Gather our rival faiths within Thy fold; Rend each man'��s temple veil, and bid it fall, That we may know that Thou hast been of old. Gather us in'�'we worship only Thee; In varied names we stretch a common hand; In diverse forms a common soul we see; In many ships we seek one spirit land. Thine ...read
Devotional	Hope in Waiting       "It is good that a man should both hope and quietly wait for the salvation of the Lord" (Lam. 3:26). What a singular combination--hope and quiet waiting! It is like a union of poetry and prose. Does it not seem an incongruous mixture of sentiments! We associate hope with impulse; quiet waiting is surely the want of impulse! Hope is a state of f ...read
Devotional	Law of Liberty       "...the law of liberty" (James 2:12). There are two theories in the world about the human will. One says, "Man is a slave; he is bound hand and foot; he is for ever under law." The other says, "Man is free; he is master of his own actions; law has no dominion over him." St. James suggests terms of peace between the opposing views. He says that ...read
Devotional	Left Behind       "Thou shalt not number the tribe of Levi...The Levites shall keep the charge of the tabernacle of testimony." (Num. 1:49,53). Here was apparently a neglected set of men--a class overlooked in the enrolment of the people. They were to be uncounted, discounted. A spectator would have said they were a specimen of those unfit for survival. In all t ...read
Hymn	Make Me a Captive, Lord       Make me a captive, Lord, and then I shall be free. Force me to render up my sword, and I shall conqueror be. I sink in life'��s alarms when by myself I stand; Imprison me within Thine arms, and strong shall be my hand. My heart is weak and poor until it master find; It has no spring of action sure, it varies with the wind. It cannot freely ...read
Devotional	Natural Law       "The Lord brought an east wind...and when it was morning, the east wind brought the locusts" (Exod. 10:13). One is inclined to ask, Why bring the east wind at all? God was about to send a special providence for the deliverance of His people from Egypt. He was about to inflict the Egyptians with a plague of locusts. The locusts were to be His sp ...read
Hymn	O Love That Wilt Not Let Me Go       Matheson said about this hymn: My hymn was composed in the manse of Innelan [Argyleshire, Scotland] on the evening of the 6th of June, 1882, when I was 40 years of age. I was alone in the manse at that time. It was the night of my sister's marriage, and the rest of the family were staying overnight in Glasgow. Something happened to me, which was ...read
Devotional	Riding the Storms       "Against thy holy child Jesus--both Herod and Pontius Pilate were gathered together, For to do whatsoever thy hand and thy counsel determined before to be done" (Acts 4:27-28). The sentence ends just in the opposite way to what we are prepared for. We expect it to read thus: "Against Thy holy child Jesus both Herod and Pilate were gathered toge ...read
Devotional	When We Remember       "A new heart also will I give you. Then shall ye remember your own evil ways" (Ezek. 36:26,31). The prophet says that the memory of our badness only comes after we have become good. "A new heart will I give you; then shall ye remember your own evil ways." One would have expected the opposite statement. We should have looked for such words as th ...read

The Dilemma of the Disobedient

Theodore Epp

1 Samuel 28:1-19

David and his men became bodyguards to Achish, king of Gath, and this soon put David in a dilemma. The Philistines decided to go against the Israelites, and David apparently could see no way out of going along and fighting against his own people. He had a weakness for telling lies when doubts came into his heart. This was one of his besetting sins. He had lied to Jonathan and, through Jonathan, to Saul. He had lied to Ahimelech, and that had brought death to 85 priests.

When Saul saw the Philistines, he desperately wanted help to know what to do. The story of his visit to the witch of En-dor is well known. Samuel had been dead for some time, and Saul had no one he could turn to who would reveal to him God's will. It was in keeping with Saul's character to have issued orders to destroy everyone who sought contact with the dead, such as the witch of En-dor, and then, when he found himself facing a real difficulty, to seek the help of just such an evil person.

The witch of En-dor was terrified when she discovered that it was not the evil spirit for whom she was a medium who appeared to Saul. It was Samuel himself. Once again we see that Saul's great sin was the sin of rebellion against the will of God. May we always seek to know God's will in order that we may do it.

"But the wicked are like the troubled sea, when it cannot rest, whose waters cast up mire and dirt. There is no peace, saith my God, to the wicked" (Isa. 57:20,21).

John Newton - I Am Not What I Once Was

God's Wind

By Mrs. Charles E. Cowman


"I will cause thee to ride upon the high places of the earth" (Isa. 58:14).

Those who fly through the air in airships tell us that one of the first rules they learn is to turn their ship toward the wind, and fly against it. The wind lifts the ship up to higher heights. Where did they learn that? They learned it from the birds. If a bird is flying for pleasure, it goes with the wind. But if the bird meets danger, it turns right around and faces the wind, in order that it may rise higher; and it flies away towards the very sun.

Sufferings are God's winds, His contrary winds, sometimes His strong winds. They are God's hurricanes, but, they take human life and lift it to higher levels and toward God's heavens.

You have seen in the summer time a day when the atmosphere was so oppressive that you could hardly breathe? But a cloud appeared on the western horizon and that cloud grew larger and threw out rich blessing for the world. The storm rose, lightning flashed and thunder pealed. The storm covered the world, and the atmosphere was cleansed; new life was in the air, and the world was changed.

Human life is worked out according to exactly the same principle. When the storm breaks the atmosphere is changed, clarified, filled with new life; and a part of heaven is brought down to earth. --Selected

Obstacles ought to set us singing. The wind finds voice, not when rushing across the open sea, but when hindered by the outstretched arms of the pine trees, or broken by the fine strings of an Aeolian harp. Then it has songs of power and beauty. Set your freed soul sweeping across the obstacles of life, through grim forests of pain, against even the tiny hindrances and frets that love uses, and it, too, will find its singing voice. --Selected
"Be like a bird that, halting in its flight,
Rests on a bough too slight.
And feeling it give way beneath him sings,
Knowing he hath wings."

Filled With the Knowledge of God's Will

William Henry Griffith Thomas


"For this cause we also...do not cease to pray for you, and to desire that ye might be filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding"

(Col. 1:9).

The difficulty with so many people today is that they are superficial in their knowledge and shallow in their experience, and so are a prey to various errors, "carried about with every wind of doctrine" (Eph. 4:14). We may safely aver, then, that to be "filled with the knowledge of his will in all wisdom and spiritual understanding" means for its complete realization a constant touch with those writings which present the clearly expressed plan of God. The divine will is in that Book, and when it, the Word of God, is illuminated by the Spirit of God we, His children, come to know His will concerning us. 

Indeed, no one will ever have the full knowledge of that will, no one can possibly be mature in Christian experience, if the Word of God is not his daily, definite, direct study and meditation. It purifies the perceptive faculties by its cleansing power, it illuminates the moral faculties with its enlightening power, it controls the emotional faculties with its protective power, and it energizes the volitional faculties with its stimulating power. 

Thus, in the constant, continuous use of the Word of God in personal practice, with reverent meditation and earnest prayer, we shall indeed, to paraphrase the apostle's words "become filled with the full knowledge of His will in every avenue of perception and in their spiritual applications."