Galatians 5:16-23

THESE ARE THE TIMES that try men's souls. The Spirit has spoken expressly that in the latter times some should depart from the faith, giving heed to seducing spirits and doctrines of demons; speaking lies in hypocrisy; having their conscience seared with a hot iron. Those days are upon us and we cannot escape them; we must triumph in the midst of them, for such is the will of God concerning us.

Strange as it may seem, the danger today is greater for the fervent Christian than...

Remember, we are compared with what we could be, not just what we should be. God being who He is, and Jesus Christ being His risen and all-powerful Son, anything we ought to be we can be. Anything that God has declared that we should be we can be. In the wonderful book of Romans, perhaps the greatest and most profound book in the Bible, 7 tells us of a man who is struggling and wanting to be something that he feels he cannot be. Finally he gives up and says, "What a wretched man I am! Who...

Excerpted from The Divine Conqest

For our gospel did not come to you in word only, but also in power, and in the Holy Spirit and with deep conviction, as you know what kind of men we were among you for your sake. (1Ths. 1:5)

If anyone is in Christ, he is a new creation. (2 Corinthians 5:17)

You have a reputation of being alive, but you are dead. (Revelation 3:1)

To one who...

For Reading and Meditation:     Galatians 5:16-26

So important is the point we raised yesterday - the need for selective expression - that we will spend another day considering it. Listen to how the Amplified Bible translates Psalm 73:15: "Had I spoken thus and given expression to my feelings, I would have been untrue...

For Reading and Meditation:     Romans 7:14-8:4

Yesterday we ended by saying that God can impart purity as well as impute it, and He then helps us apply it in our daily life and experience. Permit me to share my own personal experience in this connection, not as a model for you to follow, but simply to illustrate how God revealed Himself to me. Following my...

For Reading and Meditation:     Isaiah 3:1-11

Now we pause to ask ourselves how this fifth Beatitude, when practised, engenders within us good mental and spiritual health. Psychologists have shown that those who lack the qualities of mercy and compassion are more likely to develop physical problems. Harsh, judgmental attitudes may bring a sense of satisfaction to...

For Reading and Meditation:     Colossians 1:1-14

Yesterday we saw that when we make it a goal to hunger and thirst after happiness, we get nowhere, but when we make it our goal to hunger and thirst after righteousness, we get everywhere. Once again Jesus touches on an aspect of good mental health when He teaches us through these words to focus on right goals....

For Reading and Meditation:     Psalm 149:1-9

We come now to Christ's third prescription for happiness: "Blessed are the meek, for they will inherit the earth" (Matthew 5:5). How we have shied away from that word "meek". We have thought of meekness as weakness and thus have a totally wrong concept of what Jesus meant....

We who looks at his own character and position from a legal point of view, will not only despair when he comes to the end of his reckoning, but if he be a wise man he will despair at the beginning; for if we are to be judged on the footing of the law, there shall no flesh living be justified. How blessed to know that we dwell in the domains of grace and not of law! When thinking of my state before God the question is not, "Am I perfect in myself before the law?" but, "Am I perfect in Christ...

In every believer's heart there is a constant struggle between the old nature and the new. The old nature is very active, and loses no opportunity of plying all the weapons of its deadly armoury against newborn grace; while on the other hand, the new nature is ever on the watch to resist and destroy its enemy. Grace within us will employ prayer, and faith, and hope, and love, to cast out the evil; it takes unto it the "whole armour of God," and wrestles earnestly. These two opposing natures...