The power of Christ’s resurrection

by Charles Spurgeon.

Once more—the resurrection of Christ is operating at this present time with a quickening power on all who hear the word aright. The sun is, to the vegetable world, a great source of growth. In this month of April he goes forth with life in his beams and we see the result.

The buds are bursting, the trees are putting on their summer dress, the flowers are smiling and even the seeds which we buried in the earth are beginning to feel the vivifying warmth. They see not the Lord of day but they feel his smile. Over what an enormous territory is the returning sun continually operating! How potent are his forces when he crosses the line and lengthens the day!

Such is the risen Christ. In the grave he was like the sun in his winter solstice but he crossed the line in his resurrection. He has brought us all the hopes of spring and is bringing us the joys of summer. He is quickening many at this hour and will yet quicken myriads. This is the power with which the missionary goes forth to sow; this is the power in which the preacher at home continues to scatter the seed. The risen Christ is the great producer of harvests. By the power of his resurrection men are raised from their death in sin to eternal life.

***

Charles Spurgeon delivered this message on Sunday April 21, 1889 at the Metropolitan Tabernacle, Newington, London.

Grace!

True grace is a free gift from the giver of grace.

We should not complain about anything especially not when somebody received grace. As a community we should be gracious to one another and rejoice when someone have received grace.

On the contrary we moan and complain about the unfairness of this world and about the one not getting what he or she deserve…

GRACE IS A FREE GIFT THAT NO ONE EVER HAVE NOR EVER WILL BE ABLE TO EARN!!!

If Revival Is Witheld

If revival is being withheld from us it is because some idol remains still enthroned; because we still insist in placing our reliance in human schemes; because we still refuse to face the unchangeable truth that, “It is not by might, but by My Spirit.”

Jonathan Goforth (February 10, 1859 – October 8, 1936, Canadian Missionary to China)

CONDEMNATION

Jesus freed us from condemnation and gave us the power to be free from sin!

Has no one condemned you? ”
“No one, Lord,” she answered. “Neither do I condemn you,” said Jesus. “Go, and from now on do not sin anymore.”
(John 8:10-11).

“I am the light of the world. Anyone who follows Me will never walk in the darkness but will have the light of life.”
(John 8:12).

“When Christ calls a man, he bids him to come and die”.
Dietrich Bonhoeffer

No, we are not perfect, but we can choose to walk in the light, and lay bare our sins.

But if we walk in the light as He Himself is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. If we say, “We have no sin,” we are deceiving ourselves, and the truth is not in us. If we confess our sins, He is faithful and righteous to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.
(1John 1:7-9).

We are not perfect believers because we have no sin, but because we invite Jesus (THE LIGHT) and Father God into our lives and into absolutely every situation we may face – good or bad…

This does not give free reign to sin, but freedom from condemnation.

Total Fulfilment

Why do we do what we do?

“Ho! Everyone who thirsts, Come to the waters; And you who have no money, Come, buy and eat. Yes, come, buy wine and milk Without money and without price.
Why do you spend money for what is not bread, And your wages for what does not satisfy?
Listen carefully to Me, and eat what is good, And let your soul delight itself in abundance. Incline your ear, and come to Me. Hear, and your soul shall live; And I will make an everlasting covenant with you— The sure mercies of David. Indeed I have given him as a witness to the people, A leader and commander for the people.
Surely you shall call a nation you do not know, And nations who do not know you shall run to you, Because of the LORD your God, And the Holy One of Israel; For He has glorified you.”
Seek the LORD while He may be found, Call upon Him while He is near. Let the wicked forsake his way, And the unrighteous man his thoughts; Let him return to the LORD, And He will have mercy on him; And to our God, For He will abundantly pardon.
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, Nor are your ways My ways,” says the LORD. “For as the heavens are higher than the earth, So are My ways higher than your ways, And My thoughts than your thoughts. “For as the rain comes down, and the snow from heaven, And do not return there, But water the earth, And make it bring forth and bud, That it may give seed to the sower And bread to the eater, So shall My word be that goes forth from My mouth; It shall not return to Me void, But it shall accomplish what I please, And it shall prosper in the thing for which I sent it.
“For you shall go out with joy, And be led out with peace; The mountains and the hills Shall break forth into singing before you, And all the trees of the field shall clap their hands. Instead of the thorn shall come up the cypress tree, And instead of the brier shall come up the myrtle tree; And it shall be to the LORD for a name, For an everlasting sign that shall not be cut off.”
(Isaiah 55:1-13 NKJV).

There are so many things that we do, but so few of it actually brings fulfilment.
Man was created with specific needs such as love, acceptance, recognition and security.
These needs can only be satisfied by God Himself, but we do not always recognize it and go find satisfaction from people, things and places that actually leaves a bigger hole in our lives.

Here in Isaiah 55 we see the invitation from God inviting us to come freely…
We do not need money, riches, greatness, power, strength or perfection to accept this invitation, we only need to respond to God’s word and come to Him. Just look at the blessing and the reward of accepting this invitation. We are satisfied with food and drink, our souls will be delighted in abundance, we will enter into an everlasting covenant and we will become a place of salvation to the nations (all people)…

Jesus said in John 4 that His food is to do the will of His Father who send Him.
We will also be able to eat and drink from this when we walk in God’s will, but first we must accept His invitation!

“For My people have committed two evils: They have forsaken Me, the fountain of living waters, And hewn themselves cisterns—broken cisterns that can hold no water.
(Jeremiah 2:13 NKJV).

God’s invitation is for mankind to return to Him and to correct these two evils. We leave the fountain of living water when we reject God’s invitation, or when we walk away from God and allow other things in our lives to dictate what and how we do things.

Let us look at a few scriptures regarding The Fountain of Life:

For with You is the fountain of life; In Your light we see light.
(Psalms 36:9 NKJV).

The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life, To turn one away from the snares of death.
(Proverbs 14:27 NKJV).

O LORD, the hope of Israel, All who forsake You shall be ashamed. “Those who depart from Me Shall be written in the earth, Because they have forsaken the LORD, The fountain of living waters.”
(Jeremiah 17:13 NKJV).

And it will come to pass in that day That the mountains shall drip with new wine, The hills shall flow with milk, And all the brooks of Judah shall be flooded with water; A fountain shall flow from the house of the LORD And water the Valley of Acacias.
(Joel 3:18 NKJV).

“In that day a fountain shall be opened for the house of David and for the inhabitants of Jerusalem, for sin and for uncleanness.
(Zechariah 13:1 NKJV).

And He said to me, “It is done! I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. I will give of the fountain of the water of life freely to him who thirsts.
(Revelation 21:6 NKJV).

We can see here that God is the fountain of life and we may drink from Him!!!
This fountain brings salvation, and cleanses us from sin and all other uncleanness…

What will satisfy you?

As for me, I will see Your face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake in Your likeness.
(Psalms 17:15 NKJV).

Remember success is not a destination but a way of living.

This is a destination – (I will be successful when I’m rich)

What is success for you?

Love,
Thomas Dreyer

GRACE AND REST

I took the liberty to post this article, it was posted by a brother on FB…He is Asian so there is a little bit of broken English but it was so good I had to share it…

I had pleasant encounter with one of my former elder’s wife recently and I was delighted to see her. Although our encounter was brief the short fellowship was sweet. She did express her surprise whilst we have not conducted any Gospel rallies, my church has grown significantly both in quantity and quality. As a caring and loving lady she also expressed to me her concern on our preaching and our emphasis on grace and on rest. How can we tell people to do nothing?

Here is a common misunderstanding. When we preach grace we mean we are to rest in the FINISHED work of Christ. We do mean not resting and doing nothing. Resting in the FINISHED work of Christ allows us to do what HE wants us to do and not what we think we should do. Further it is HE that work in us to DO and to WILL.

Many at times we are so busy doing what we think we should be doing rather than resting on what Jesus had done. Our battle today is no longer to eradicate sin in our lives but to manifest the reality of Christ in us. It is only by allowing Jesus to be form in us that we can be mortified sin in our bodies. This is done by realizing our position in Christ as being dead to sin ALREADY.

Why does God ask us to live according to faith? I think it is because He realizes from the scope of eternity, that the fact that we are dead to sin IS our real reality. God calls us to believe this to be our real reality because it IS the real reality. It is when we believe His reality, we begin to manifest the finished work of Jesus in our lives. That is how we overcome sin by faith. Not by power nor by our might but by the operation of the Spirit of Christ.

That I believe is why Paul tells us our position before he tells us what to do. In fact I believe Paul does not tell us what to do but what to believe. According to Paul our behaviour is really the product of our belief. Our belief dictates what we do. This is the mystery. That God can be in us through Christ. The hope of Glory.

As such the reality is this. We cannot serve a God who is not served by human hands. Yet the book of Hebrews tells us that HE purged our conscience to serve a living God. This means my Father cannot be served by people who have a conscience which is NOT PURGED. In context, a CONSCIENCE that is NOT PURGED is a conscience who does not believe that is fully forgiven.

It is no wonder why God cannot be served by HUMAN hands. These are hands which based on a righteousness which requires to be CONSTANTLY be forgiven. This is our default mode. Forgiveness based on our asking, our begging and on a basis that we pride ourselves with a guilty conscience or sin conscienceness.

The writer of Hebrews exhort us to believe our sins are forgiven once and FOR ALL. Hence a purged conscience. That is when we are fit to serve a Holy God. We serve God hence with the WOUNDED HANDS of Jesus not by human effort.

I verily state this serving God with HUMAN hands is serving Him with our effort. It is the same thing Cain did. It is the same thing that Saul did. It is the very thing the Pharisees did. It is serving God to have your conscience clean. This is the “sin” that the writer of Hebrews is referring to in Hebrews 10. This is the sin that he refers to as “if we sin wilfully there is no more sacrifice for sin”. The belief that your conscience needs to be clean regularly.

I have come to understand that my sins are forgiven ONCE and FOR ALL. In fact if you read the verse” just as a man is destine to die once and face judgement” it is followed by “so Christ was sacrificed once to take away the sins of many people; and he will appear a second time, not to bear sin, but to bring salvation to those who are waiting for him.”

We read Hebrews 9:27 so often out of its context. If you read it again together with Hebrews 9:28 you will realize the focus is not about God’s judgement but about HOW COMPLETE God’s forgiveness is. There are 2 certainties: DEATH and TAXES. We only die once and we remain dead. In the same manner the writer of Hebrews tells us that Christ need die only ONCE and you remain FORGIVEN forever. He has taken the sins of many people.

Hence it is my humble submission if we preach to people that they are guilty until they begin to serve God is to preach a religion of “AN UNPURGED CONSCIENCE” which in actual fact is a SERVICE OF HUMAN HANDS. It results in people trying to please God for the purpose of having their conscience cleared. That is dead works.

Jesus is still serving today. He serves through my body. I am in His temple. Notice that when Jeremiah whipped the people in the temple he said 3 times: The Lord does not live in the temple any more. Notice when Jesus did the same thing he said “tear this temple down and I will build it up in 3 days”. Notice Jesus is echoing Jeremiah. God does not live in the Temple any more. Jesus said HE IS THE TEMPLE.

Paul now tells us We are his Holy Temple. He now lives in US not in some temple in heaven. That is why Jesus said when he healed the man “To prove to you that the Son of Man have authority to forgive sins ON EARTH!” God is no longer dwelling far away in heaven. He is in US.

Hence it is HE that breathes and lives in me and He is the one serving. That is why I rest and He works. That is why I come to him with “fear and much trembling” so that it is not my eloquence. NOT MY BLOOD SWEAT AND TEARS. It is by the power of the Holy Spirit. It is BY HIS BLOOD SWEAT AND TEARS on the cross. The Blood Sweat and Tears is a done deal! It is not a deal yet to be done…

That is why I preach about God’s rest. That is also why my church despite little effort on the part of the believers is growing. It is because Jesus is working. It is also because of that I have no glory but Jesus receives ALL the glory. I boast of my Lord. He is AWESOME AND DESERVES ALL MY WORSHIP.

Simon