John 17:1 Niv

On our farm in Pennsylvania there were cherry trees which were attacked by little parasites of some sort. A parasite would get into a little branch, pierce the bark and exude a gum. Then the branch would get a knot on it and bend. All over the trees were those little bent places with gummy knots. After two or three years, those cherry trees would not bloom. If they did, the blooms usually dropped early and the cherries did not come to fruition. If the blooms did not drop early, the cherries...

Two other considerations may help us here. One is that our Lord did on at least one occasion pray for sinners. "Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing," was a request made to God on behalf of evil men. Is it not reasonable that if Christ prayed for sinners once, He may be expected to pray for them again" Also we must remember that Jesus was a Son of man and frequently referred to Himself by that title. As such, He had and has a relationship to the whole human race. Is...

Who can deny that there are certain persons who, though still unconverted, nevertheless differ from the crowd, marked out of God, stricken with an interior wound and susceptible to the call of God" In the prayer of Jesus in John 17:1lb, He said: "Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me." Surely no man is ever the same after God has laid His hand upon him. He will have certain marks, perhaps some not easy to detect....

The doctrine of the divine indwelling is one of the most important in the New Testament, and its meaning for the individual Christian is precious beyond all description. To neglect it is to suffer serious loss. The apostle Paul prayed for the Ephesian Christians that Christ might dwell in their hearts by faith. Surely it takes faith of a more than average vitality to grasp the full implications of this great truth. Two facts join to make the doctrine difficult to accept: the supreme...

For Reading and Meditation:     2 Timothy 3:12-17

We continue from where we left off yesterday in saying that persecution is one of the proofs that we are true disciples of the Lord Jesus Christ. Many Christians find great difficulty in coming to terms with this issue of persecution, and because they have never understood that those who reject Christ will also...

For Reading and Meditation:     Hebrews 6:1-20

Out of all the aspects of truth that surround the fact of our Lord's ascension, one of the greatest is surely this - Christ is our Precursor. A precursor is really a forerunner - an advance runner - and that is precisely the term which our text for today applies to the climactic ministry of our ascended Lord. The NIV...

Twice in His great high priestly prayer, our Lord prayed that His people might be one (verses 21 and 22, 23). This prayer for unity has been seized as Scriptural support for the ecumenical movement - a great organizational union of all professing Christian churches. Unfortunately this ecumenical unity is achieved through abandoning or reinterpreting fundamental Christian doctrines. As Malcolm Muggeridge wrote, "By one of our time's larger ironies, ecumenicalism is triumphant just when there...

Jesus . . . lifted up His eyes to heaven, and said: “Father … Holy Father … O righteous Father!” § He said, “Abba, Father.” § Because you are sons, God has sent forth the Spirit of His Son into your hearts, crying out, “Abba, Father!” § For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father. Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God.Doubtless You are our Father … You, O Lord, are our...

For as the body is one and has many members, but all the members of that one body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. For by one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free—and have all been made to drink into one Spirit.God is faithful, by whom you were called into the fellowship of His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord. § That which we have seen and heard we declare to you, that you also may have fellowship with us; and truly our...

Not that I have already attained, or am already perfected … I do not count myself to have apprehended; but one thing I do, forgetting those things which are behind and reaching forward to those things which are ahead, I press toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.Enoch walked with God; and he was not, for God took him.Grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.§ We all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a...