"Christ The Overcomer Of The World"

"...Christ meets the Pharisee, and pays no honour to his phylactery; He confronts the Sadducee, and yields not to his cold philosophy, neither does He conceal the difficulties of the faith to escape his sneer; and He braves also the Herodian, who is the worldly politician, and He gives him an unanswerable reply.He is the same before them all, master in all postions, overcoming the world's wisdom and supposed intelligence by His own simple testimony to the truth.

And He overcame the world in His life best of all by the constancy of His love. He loved the most unlovely men, He loved those who hated Him, He loved those who despised Him. You and I are readily turned aside from loving when we receive ungrateful treatment, and thus we are conquered by the world; but He kept to His great object--'He saved others, Himself He could not Save;' and He died with this prayer on His lips, 'Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do.' Not soured in the least, thou blessed Saviour, thou art at the last just as tender as at the first. We have seen fine spirits, full of generosity, who have had to deal with a crooked and perverse generation, until they have at last grown hard and cold. Nero, who weeps when he signs the first death warrent of a criminal, at last comes to gloat in the blood of his subjects. Thus do sweet flowers wither into noxious corruption. As for Thee, precious Saviour, Thou art ever fragrant with love. No spot comes upon Thy lovely character, though Thou dost traverse a miry road. Thou art as kind to men at Thy departure as Thou wast at Thy coming, for Thou hast overcomw the world." -CH Spurgeon

Love surely is the greatest of all these. But this love must not be a humanistic love, but a divine love; the fruit bore only through the Spirit of love, the Spirit of Christ Himself.
For one can give all his goods to the poor, and do tremendous things in this world, but without the love of Christ as the motive, it is in vain, and without reward. Truth and love must be mingled, and become a mixture within the heart, as if one substance has formed from truth and love.

The heart cannot produce love without truth, nor speak true truth without love. And only the Sprirt of Christ, by His gracious grace can accomplish the bearing of this fruit in a believers life. May the Lord grant us much fruit in our lives. For His glory. Amen.

"America! America! God shed His grace on thee Till selfish gain no longer stain The banner of the free!"-Katharine Lee Bates

"Our fathers' God, to thee,
author of liberty, to thee we sing;
long may our land be bright
with freedom's holy light;
protect us by thy might, great God, our King."-(My Country, 'Tis of Thee-Samuel F. Smith, 1808-1895)


I thank the Lord for allowing me to be born in America. It's a wonderful nation in many ways. Especially the freedom we have. But it's a sinful nation as well. How does God work with nations? And how does a nation, or republic, relate to the Church?

Here are some words from Charles Spurgeon that I thought may help:

" ... the Master overcame the world, in that He did not stoop to use its power. He did not use that form of power which is peculiar to the world even for unselfish purposes. ...But He conquered the world in that He would not employ in the slightest degree this form of power. He might have gathered a troop about Him, and His heroic example, together with His miraculous power, must soon have swept away the Roaman empire, and converted the Jew; and then across Europe and Asia and Africa His victorious legions might have gone trampling down all manner of evil, and with the cross for His banner, and sword for His weapon, the idols would have fallen, and the whole world must have been made to bow at His feet. But no, when Peter takes out the sword, He says, 'Put up thy sword into its sheath, they that take the sword shall perish by the sword.' Well did He say, 'My kingdom is not of this world, else would My servants fight.'

And He might if He had pleased have allied His church with the state, as His mistaken friends have done in these degenerate times, and then there might have been penal laws against those who dared dissent, and there might have been forced contributions for the support of His church and such like things. You have read, I dare say, of such things being done, but not in the Gospels, nor in the Acts of the Apostles. These things are done by those who forget the Christ of God, for he uses no instrument but love, no sword but the truth, no power but the Eternal Spirit, and, in the very fact that He put all the worldly forces aside, He overcame the world."


Some wonderful words here to ponder.
May the Lord help us be a courageous Church, and never shrink back from speaking the truth in love, and at the same time show all meekness and gentleness as our Lord Jesus calls us to, and who said Himself, "Learn of Me, for I am gentle and meek." And in matters of government, and vengence, let us give way to the Lord's hand there, as He is certainly sovereign over ever nation, and the governing powers, in order to use the sword through His ministers against evildoers, and keep justice in His hand of providence. Amen.

Another relaxing vacation in St. Michaels. Thank You Lord!

We had such a fine time, Patti and I, as we went to our favorite place: The Inn @ Perry Cabin, in St. Michaels, on the Eastern shore of the Chesapeake Bay. They have an outstanding pool, and spa. I did go and ask how much to have your finger nails done. Not that I'd do that. I was just curious. $39. That's $3.90 per finger nail! And they were booked up for two days. Crazy.

The workout room was great, and we had an excellent boat ride. Actually we wanted to go on the boat, but decided it was a bit too much for us this year, because it's $60 per person. However, the captain, bumped into us out on the peer, and almost made us get on his boat with his invitation to come with him. It was a real blessing. It's quite a nice time, and it was a beautiful day.

Mainly, we just relaxed, and enjoyed being there. The Lord always seems to bless us extra special when we go to St. Michaels, and this time was the same.
All I can do is "Rejoice in the Lord always. Again I will say, rejoice!"

"And Jesus lifted up His eyes, and said, 'Father, I thank You that You have heard Me." John 11:41

"This is a remarkable expression. Our Lord begins with "thanks," when man would have expected Him to offer prayer. How shall we explain it? ....

The subject is a deep and mysterious one, and I shrink from giving a very positive opinion about it. That our Lord constantly prayed, on all occassions, we know from the Gospels. That He prayed sometimes with great agony of mind and with tears, we also know. (Heb. 5:7) But how far He could know anything of that peculiar struggle which we poor sinners have to carry on with doubt, fear, and anxiety, in our prayers is another question altogether, and very hard to answer. One might suppose that One who was a man, entirely holy, humble, and without sin, might be able to thank for prayer heard, almost as soon as prayer was offered. Upon this theory the sentence before us would be plain: "I pray that Lazarus may be raised; and I thank Thee at the same time for hearing My prayer, as I know Thou dost."

And yet we must not forget two of our Lord's prayers not granted, apparently: "Father, save Me from this hour;"--Father, let this cup pass from Me." It is, however, only fair to say that the first of these prayers is greatly qualified by the context, and the second by the words, "If it be possible."

We may note here, as elsewhere, what an example of thankfulness, as well as prayerfulness, our Lord always supplies. Well if it was followed! His people are always more ready to ask than to thank. The more grace in a heart the more humility, the more humility the more praise." -John Charles Ryle

















I always imagined our Lord Jesus perhaps kneeling before the tomb for a moment, and then standing and declaring His thanksgiving. And He may well have, but we can't be sure. I thought these words from the Bishop are good to consider.

May we all be encouraged to pray big prayers to our Lord God, and always be grateful that we are able to come before His holy throne: But, only because of the broken and wounded body of His Beloved Christ. God loves for us to ask Him to do great things, and then to trust Him in His faithfulness.

Thank You Jesus for being such a fine example to us. And for making us righteous in Your death, so we can come to the Father of the universe. Thank You for the Holy Scriptures. Amen.