Bowen's Daily Meditations

These robes are symbolical of their characters once defiled, now made pure by virtue of the faith which they have exercised in him who died on Calvary that he might redeem us from all iniquity and purify us unto himself a peculiar people. Observe here that their agency is spoken of. It was, indeed, the blood of the Lamb that purged away the stains ; but they had something to do; they saw and loathed the impurity of their garments, they approached the fountain, and washed them white. Christ...

Almost all men are intent upon appearing better than they really are. If a man cannot be what he ought to be, he attempts at least to appear so. His days are spent in a fraudulent attempt to pass himself off as something better than he is. The same amount of energy devoted to the purification of his character, might result in something good. What watchfulness! What circumspection! What attention to circumstances! What study of men's characters! What perseverance! What self-command! Were...

We have here not two commandments, but one. Faith is naught without love; and love without faith is not the love that is here commanded. "Love believeth all things;" and faith " worketh by love," exhibits itself in love. Selfishness is the grand impediment-of love; but faith is that which gets the victory over selfishness, by showing a man his utter unworthiness and the perfect folly of living unto himself Faith makes us acquainted with the love of Christ, and in fact introduces it into the...

That is to say, carry on the life which Christ lived. In him love made its advent to the earth; and the prayer recorded in the seventeenth chapter of John, shows plainly that the idea of the Saviour was not that that divine love should take its departure with him from the earth, but that it should abide and have an inextinguishable life in his disciples, from generation to generation, until he should come again. This, then, is your vocation. To walk by faith, and to walk in love, let these...

Whatever constitutes, in our opinion, our chief ground of distinction, that is the thing in which we glory. Like the fabled jewel in the toad, so there is in almost every man, if we may believe him, a very wonderful jewel. He finds it in himself; though with respect to others the whole thing is a fable. But even if there were this diamond in a man's nature, the presence of self-esteem would turn it to carbon again. To pride yourself on any good is to lose that good. Virtue comes to you, not...

And he only; for "he that believeth not the Son shall not see life; but the wrath of God abideth on him." Several important matters loom upon us in this little statement. One of the most unintelligible things, to the world, is the declaration so constantly made in the Scriptures, that man is without life. At the very beginning of human history, Satan introduced, as a substitute for God's doctrine that man would die in the day of his transgression, his own opposing doctrine that man would not...

In these words we read the future destinies of the world. When an Alexander arises and hurries through the world, snatching crowns on the right hand and on the left, and threatening to take unto himself all sublunary power, the people of God are told to fear not; the kingdom is for them, not him. So too when a Julius Caesar grasps at the sceptre of universal dominion. And when a Napoleon appears on the scene, they calmly wait to see him and his kingdom vanish. For they have looked with...

One of the greatest triumphs ever obtained by Satan, was when he induced men, from motives utterly unscriptural, and in connection with a system not Christian, to institute religious orders consecrated to poverty and external humiliation. In recoiling from this error, Protestantism has, it is to be feared, recoiled from the truth of which it is a perversion. The doctrine illustrating the spirituality of Christianity, voluntary sacrifice of position, wealth or ease, in order that the...

This is said to the well-doer. To one even who is no novice in well-doing; but has been some time engaged in deeds of beneficence. You have begun well; you have gone on well; but persevere. It may be that your kindness is not appreciated; that your self-denial for the sake of others is even ridiculed; that your motives are misrepresented; and that the more you love, the less you are loved. But your well-doing is not well doing if it be gone about chiefly for the sake of man's appreciation....

The reason is assigned and it is unanswerable: - " He ever liveth to make intercession for them." He lives forever, clothed with all the power derived from his propitiatory death, and animated by the same heart of love that led him to die; he lives in the very place where we most need him; he is there perpetually in our "behalf". He was not more truly on the earth for us than he is in heaven for us, and we may confidently expect to be saved unto the uttermost. Once we had no access to God....

This is said with reference to some that appear unto men to be the children of God, and afterwards fall away. Christians have no promise that they shall be kept from misconceptions on this point; and they are sometimes greatly shocked to find the court of God's house strewn with columns. God is the architect of his temple, and is cognizant of his own plan; he allows stones and pillars to be placed in the edifice which he knows do not permanently belong to it; but for the places they...

He will not modify his purposes to suit our unbelief. What madness to suppose that he will imitate us; and seeing that we make light of his faithfulness, make light of it himself. Let God be true, though every man a liar. God once declared his purpose of bringing a deluge upon the earth. Men would not believe the terrific word. The whole human race combined to rear up a wall of unbelief under the protection of which they thought themselves safe. On the one hand were all mankind with their "...

When he was on the earth, leading a life of sorrows and perfecting his acquaintance with grief, no man appeared to covet the privilege of suffering with him. John and James, indeed, before they had obtained a glimpse of the cross, were bold to say, " We are able to drink of thy cup, and to be baptized with thy baptism." Thomas also said, " Let us also go that we may die with him.' Peter said, " I will lay down my life for thy sake." So likewise said they all. Yet when the hour of his...

He died for all; a glorious truth repeated in every variety of language, and oftentimes with the utmost explicitness that language can admit of. By virtue of this unlimited atonement, salvation may be offered to all, the gospel to every creature, the water of life to whomsoever will; by virtue of this, men that believe not are condemned because they have not believed on the Son of God, and men are convinced of sin be cause of unbelief. It is this that gives its pathos to the language of...