July 7

“I sat down under his shadow with great delight, and his fruit was sweet to my taste.” Song of Songs 2:3

To the true believer, the love of Christ is all-sufficient. In it the Christian finds rest, protection, and satisfaction. The singer of this song has told of running after her beloved, but now she exclaims with joy that she has come to rest. Like a tree, his shadow is over her and his fruit gives her deep satisfaction.

No noonday heat can penetrate, no fever exhaust the one who flees to Christ for shelter. As he comes to rest beneath the ever green coolness of the Savior’s love, he finds only “great delight” and a marvelous uplift of spirit.

Moreover, he is not only protected from the scorching heat of circumstances, he is inwardly refreshed. There are some trees which, though always green, do not bear fruit; but Christ is the unique tree of life. At one and the same time he affords shade from the burning heat of the day and satisfying fruit for our inward sustenance.

July 6

“O ye that love Jehovah, hate evil.” Psalm 97:10

Before ever we discuss the subject of deliverance from sin, we must first mention a condition or qualification of those who are to be delivered. Even though God’s deliverance is prepared for all, not all are delivered.

The Apostle Paul indicates this almost unconsciously in Romans 7. In the experience described there, he finally becomes emancipated because he has fulfilled the condition of knowing what to hate as well as what to desire.

We read not only how he gets released, but also how he feels in his heart before he is released: “For not what I would, that do I practice; but what I hate, that I do” (Romans 7:15).

Hence the first and foremost question today is: Do you love what you are doing now, or do you hate it? The apostle was so unwilling to live a life in sin that he was determined to get out of it. It was due to his hatred of it and his determination to find an escape that he found deliverance.

July 5

“Are ye so foolish? having begun in the Spirit, are ye now perfected in the flesh?” Galatians 3:3    

Paul makes it clear in his letter to the Romans that the sinner depends on the grace of God for his salvation. In Galatians he shows us that the believer depends equally upon that grace for his continuance in the Christian life. We never did anything, or gave God anything, for our salvation, and this must be the basis of our walk with him.

God begins by giving us a new position so that we have a new start. If I am down at the bottom of a pit, then I continue there with no way of getting out of it until God lifts me out and puts me upon a rock. He does this by placing me in Christ. By doing so he has settled all my past.

But he has gone further than that. By placing the life of Christ within me, he has given me all I need for the present and for the entire future. Spiritual progress, then, is not by an agonizing striving to attain, but by looking trustfully to God’s grace and continuing to receive of Christ’s fullness. 

July 4

“That he might sanctify it, having cleansed it by the washing of water with the word.” Ephesians 5:26

God’s highest revelation of the Church is seen in this letter. Its outstanding feature is that it starts, not with sinners being saved, but with their having been chosen in Christ. Thus in Ephesians something transcendent is unveiled to us. We see the Church, chosen in Christ before the foundation of the world, formed out from him, and destined forever to manifest his glory.

At the same time, however, Ephesians shows us that man’s sin and man’s fall are facts. Every one of us who belongs to Christ possesses a new spirit which is truly of him, but alongside this there are still in us many things which are not of Christ. That is why we are told in this verse about Christ’s activities to cleanse us. He wants to restore us till we completely match with God’s eternal design. It is true, therefore, that God plans to bring us to the place where cleansing is no longer necessary, but today we still need to be cleansed.

July 3

“They gave him wine to drink mingled with gall: and when he had tasted it, he would not drink.” Matthew 27:34

To condemn a man to the cross was to condemn him to an agonizing death, but it was permitted to alleviate the sufferings of the crucified by offering a drink of gall mixed with wine or vinegar, and no doubt the slightest alleviation of his pain was welcomed by the condemned.

Our Lord, however, was an exception. When he tasted the drink that was lifted to his lips, he refused it. There was nothing in him that cried out for the easing of his pain. We profess to bear the cross, but how eager we are to drink that wine mingled with gall! May we awake to the truth that if we are yearning for an anodyne, we are not truly bearing the cross of Christ. Only those who find their trials irksome need a soothing draught.

How we love sympathy! We have an insatiable craving to be comforted, seeking it from every possible source and feeling aggrieved if it is not offered to us. Unwittingly we reveal that we know little of his cross, which involves a joyful acceptance of the, will of God.

July 2

“lf so be that ye heard him.” Ephesians 4:21

After I was saved, I used to feel dissatisfied with Peter’s sermon on the Day of Pentecost. It did not, I thought, make things clear at all, for there is nothing in it about the plan of salvation. How strange that Peter did not even use the title “Savior”!

But nevertheless, what was the result? The people, we are told, were pricked in their heart and cried, “What shall we do?” Again, to Cornelius Peter only spoke about who Christ was; he gave no explanation of the meaning of his death. Yet even so, the Holy Spirit fell upon them all.

The great weakness of present preaching of the gospel is that we try to make people understand the plan of salvation, or we try to drive people to the Lord through fear of sin and its consequences. Wherein have we failed? I am sure that it is in this, that our hearers do not see him. They only see “sin” or “salvation,” whereas their need is to see the Lord Jesus and touch him.

July 1

“Then Job arose, and rent his robe, and shaved his head, and fell down upon the ground, and worshipped.” Job 1:20

In the mystery of his ways God permitted Job to be deprived of everything he possessed, though he himself had just borne witness of him that there was “none like him in the earth, a perfect and an upright man.” Four messengers had arrived almost simultaneously with the news that within the compass of one short day, he had been stripped of everything he possessed. How did he react? He fell down before God and worshiped.

Where there is true worship, there are no complaints. Here was a man so utterly subject to God that he could unhesitatingly bow to all his ways. Let us cease questioning God’s dealings with us, and with our brothers and sisters, however baffling they may be. Let us cease asking him for explanations and in simplicity accept that his thoughts are higher than our thoughts and all his ways are perfect.