EXTOLLING GOD WITH OUR MOUTH

 BY CHARLES M. SPURGEON
  
Happy is he whose fingers are wedded to his harp.  He who praises God for mercies shall never want a mercy for which to praise....Our thankfulness is not to be a dumb thing; it should be one of the daughters of music. Our tongue is our glory, and it ought to reveal the glory of God. What a blessed mouthful is God’s praise!  How sweet, how purifying, how perfuming!  If men’s mouths were always thus filled, there would be no repining against God, or slander of neighbours.  If we continually rolled this dainty morsel under our tongue, the bitterness of daily affliction would be swallowed up in joy. God deserves blessing with the heart, and extolling with the mouth—good thoughts in the closet, and good words in the world.

—C. H. Spurgeon

Psalm 34:1

The Treasury of David

FREE WILL AND FREE GRACE--AUGUSTUS TOPLADY (1740-1778)

Augustus Toplady was an  Anglican clergyman. He is best known for his hymn writing, including Rock of Ages. He was originally an Arminian, but when light came he became a strong defender of the doctrines of grace. It caused problems with John Wesley who became a bitter opponent of Toplady because of Wesley's own Arminian beliefs. We will be pleased to allow him to tell in his own words how God taught him him free grace, and took away his allegiance to free will.

It pleased God to deliver me from the Arminian snare before I was quite eighteen.  Antecedently to that period, there was not (with the lowest self-abasement I confess it) a more haughty and violent free-willer within the compass of the four seas.  One instance of my warm and bitter zeal occurs just now to my memory.  About a twelvemonth before the Divine Goodness gave me eyes to discern, and a heart to embrace the truth, I was haranguing one day in company (for I believed myself able to cope with all the predestinarians in the world) on the universality of grace, and the powers of human free-agency. A good old gentleman (now with God) rose from his chair, and coming to mine, held me by one of my coat-buttons, while he mildly addressed me to this effect; 

“My dear Sir, there are some marks of spirituality in your conversation, though tinged with an unhappy mixture of pride and self-righteousness.  You have been speaking largely in favour of free-will; but from arguments, let us come to experience.  Do let me ask you one question.  How was it with you when the Lord laid hold on you in effectual calling?  Had you any hand in obtaining that grace?  Nay, would you not have resisted and baffled it if God’s own Spirit had left you in the hand of your own counsel?”

I felt the conclusiveness of these simple, but forcible interrogations more strongly than I was then willing to acknowledge. But, blessed be God, I have since been enabled to acknowledge the freeness and omnipotence of His grace, times without number; and to sing (what I trust will be my everlasting song when time shall be no more), “Not unto me, O Lord, not unto me, but unto Thy Name give all the glory.”

We never know so much of heaven in our own souls, nor stand so high upon the mount of communion with God, as when His Spirit, breathing on our hearts, makes us lie low at the footstool of sovereign grace, and inspires us with the cry, “O God, be mine, the comfort of salvation, but Thine be the entire praise of it.”

If you would like to more about Toplady, including more of his hymns, check out this Banner of Truth article:

http://www.banneroftruth.co.uk/pages/articles/article_detail.php?1916

SOME FATHERS IN THE BIBLE- CHARLES WOODRUFF

                                  Some Fathers in the Bible
                                                                         Adam
Adam is the first man, and therefore the father of the entire human race. He brought us misery by his fall into sin, thereby giving a sin nature to all his seed. Every human born since Adam is born in sin, and the only hope of salvation is in the last Adam, the Lord Jesus Christ
(1 Corinthians 15:45).

                                                                       Abraham
He is called the father of us all (Romans 4:16). This is spiritual truth for all the children of God through the ages, because Abraham believed God and it was counted to him for righteousness.

                                                                    Israel/ Jacob

He was the father of God’s chosen nation in the Old Testament. He had twelve sons, each becoming a tribe. The only tribe we hear much about today is Judah. This is because God separated the tribes because of apostasy. In our day, all the Hebrew people are called Jews.
                                     
                                                                            Joseph

He is the earthly father of Jesus Christ. His seed did not produce the Christ child. Christ was, and is, the virgin born Son of God. Joseph raised Jesus and taught Him the carpenter’s trade.

                                                                    God the Father

He is the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the first Person of the Godhead, and Father to all who have been born again, and placed forever in Christ. This transaction required the Father, Son, and Holy Ghost in time and eternity. We are His children ( John 1:11-13).
(perhaps we can examine all of these in depth at a future time).

Published by Charles Woodruff- email:  oursong2000@yahoo.com

CALVARY'S VICTORY- C.H. MACINTOSH

Here is a fine meditation from CHM, provided to me, and introduced  by my good friend W.F. Bell.

The cross is often not preached as the New Testament presents it.  The work of Calvary is not a defeat in any sense.  Rather, it is a glorious victory of love!  Read with wonder and holy appreciation these words from C. H. Mackintosh (1820-1896), and let us all join anew in praising our God for Calvary's victory:

 

"We behold, at the cross, the marvellous meeting of enmity and love -- sin and grace.  Man displayed at Calvary, the very height of his enmity against God.  God, blessed forever be His name, displayed the height of His love.  Hatred and love met; but love proved victorious.  God and sin met; God triumphed, sin was 'put away' (Hebrews 9:26), and now, at the resurrection side of the cross, the eternal Spirit announces the glad tidings, that 'grace reigns through righteousness unto eternal life by Jesus Christ our Lord' (Romans 5:21).  At the cross, the battle was fought and the victory won; and now the liberal hand of sovereign grace is scattering far and wide the spoils of victory."

 

When I survey the wondrous cross,

On which the Prince of glory died;

My richest gain I count but loss,

And pour contempt on all my pride.

THE HOLY SPIRIT OR RELIGIOUS TOYS AND TRIFLES

BY A. W. TOZER

"But you shall receive power when the Holy Spirit has come upon you; and you shall be witnesses to Me [Christ] in Jerusalem , and in all Judea and Samaria , and to the end of the earth” (Acts 1:8).

You know, the Church started out with a Bible, then it got a hymnbook, and for years that was it—a Bible and a hymnbook. The average church now certainly wouldn't be able to operate on just a hymnbook and the Bible. Now we have to have all kinds of truck. A lot of people couldn't serve God at all without at least a vanload of equipment to keep them happy.

Some of these attractions that we have to win people and keep them coming may be fine or they may be cheap. They may be elevated or they may be degrading. They may be artistic or they may be coarse--it all depends upon who is running the show! But the Holy Spirit is not the center of attraction, and the Lord is not the one who is in charge. We bring in all sorts of ant-scriptural and unscriptural gimmickry to keep the people happy and keep them coming.

As I see it, the great woe is not the presence of these religious toys and trifles--but the fact that they have become a necessity and the presence of the Eternal Spirit is not in our midst! ~A. W. Tozer

COME TO CHRIST WITH AN EMPTY HAND---J. C. RYLE

Beware of mistakes as to the manner of coming to Christ. Dismiss from your mind forever all idea of worthiness, merit, and fitness in yourself. Throw away all notions of goodness, righteousness, and personal deservings. Think not that you can bring anything to recommend you, or to make you deserving of Christ's notice. You must come to Him as a poor, guilty, undeserving sinner, or you cannot come at all. "But to him who doesn't work, but believes in Him who justifies the ungodly, his faith is accounted for righteousness." (Rom. 4:5.) It is the peculiar mark of the faith that justifies and saves, that it brings to Christ nothing but an empty hand.

MY HOPE IS IN THEE- J.C. PHILPOT

"And now, Lord, what wait I for? my hope is in thee." Psalm 39:7

True religion is a very simple thing. Simplicity is stamped upon all the works of God, and especially upon the work of grace. The more genuine, therefore, our religion is, the more simple it will be. To be simple is to be child-like, and to be child-like is to have that mind and spirit without which no man can enter into the kingdom of heaven. Can we, then, with this child-like simplicity, walk step by step here with David, and follow him throughout?
Can we put our seal to these things, and say, "Lord, what wait I for?" Is your religion brought into this narrow point? "Truly, my soul waiteth upon God; from him cometh my salvation." "My soul, wait thou only upon God; for my expectation is from him." Such a frame of soul is indeed from the hand of God, for no man ever did, or could bring himself into it. And if we can enter into one part of these heavenly breathings, we shall be able also to enter into the others, and say, "My hope is in thee." Feeling the weight and burden of sin, we shall be constrained to cry, "Deliver me from all my transgressions;" and feeling our own weakness, and the evil of our hearts, we shall add, "Make me not the reproach of the foolish."


If, then, we can sincerely, before God, employ these petitions, may we not ask who produced them? Who wrought this experience in the soul? From whose hands did it come? Surely, surely, the same Lord that taught David, must have taught us; the same power that wrought in him, must have wrought in us, before we could, in sweet experience, enter into this feeling language, and adopt it as our own. Here, therefore, we see a little of what true religion is; here we see what are the genuine breathings of a child-like spirit, and what is the experience of a man of God; and it will be our mercy if we can see in his experience a sweet counterpart of our own.

From Through Baca's Veil-  J.C. PHILPOT - 1802-1869