Daily Bible Notes: December, 2nd
The following daily bible notes for every day of the year, are taken from six public domain sources:
- "Morning and Evening" by Charles H.Spurgeon
- "My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year" by John H.Jowett
- "Yet Another Day - A Prayer for Every Day of the Year" by John H.Jowett
- "The Cheque Book of the Bank of Faith" by Charles H.Spurgeon
- "The Morning Message" by G.Campbell Morgan
- An Evening Meditation from "Searchlights from the Word" by G. Campbell Morgan
1. "Morning and Evening" by C.H.Spurgeon
Morning
Thou art all fair, my love.
Song of Solomon 4:7
The Lord’s admiration of His Church is very a wonderful, and His description of her beauty is very glowing. She is not merely fair , but "all fair." He views her in Himself, washed in His sin-atoning blood and clothed in His meritorious righteousness, and He considers her to be full of comeliness and beauty. No wonder that such is the case, since it is but His own perfect excellency that He admires; for the holiness, glory, and perfection of His Church are His own glorious garments on the back of His own well-beloved spouse. She is not simply pure, or well-proportioned; she is positively lovely and fair! She has actual merit! Her deformities of sin are removed; but more, she has through her Lord obtained a meritorious righteousness by which an actual beauty is conferred upon her. Believers have a positive righteousness given to them when they become "accepted in the beloved" (Eph. 1:6). Nor is the Church barely lovely, she is superlatively so. Her Lord styles her "Thou fairest among women." She has a real worth and excellence which cannot be rivalled by all the nobility and royalty of the world. If Jesus could exchange His elect bride for all the queens and empresses of earth, or even for the angels in heaven, He would not, for He puts her first and foremost - "fairest among women." Like the moon she far outshines the stars. Nor is this an opinion which He is ashamed of, for He invites all men to hear it. He sets a "behold" before it, a special note of exclamation, inviting and arresting attention. "Behold , thou art fair, my love; behold , thou art fair" (Song of Sol. 4:1). His opinion He publishes abroad even now, and one day from the throne of His glory He will avow the truth of it before the assembled universe. "Come, ye blessed of my Father" (Matt. 25:34), will be His solemn affirmation of the loveliness of His elect.
Evening
Behold, all is vanity.
Ecclesiastes 1:14
Nothing can satisfy the entire man but the Lord’s love and the Lord’s own self. Saints have tried to anchor in other roadsteads, but they have been driven out of such fatal refuges. Solomon, the wisest of men, was permitted to make experiments for us all, and to do for us what we must not dare to do for ourselves. Here is his testimony in his own words: "So I was great, and increased more than all that were before me in Jerusalem: also my wisdom remained with me. And whatsoever mine eyes desired I kept not from them, I withheld not my heart from any joy; for my heart rejoiced in all my labour: and this was my portion of all my labour. Then I looked on all the works that my hands had wrought, and on the labour that I had laboured to do: and, behold, all was vanity and vexation of spirit, and there was no profit under the sun." "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity."
What! the whole of it vanity? O favoured monarch, is there nothing in all thy wealth? Nothing in that wide dominion reaching from the river even to the sea? Nothing in Palmyra’s glorious palaces? Nothing in the house of the forest of Lebanon? In all thy music and dancing, and wine and luxury, is there nothing? "Nothing," he says, "but weariness of spirit." This was his verdict when he had trodden the whole round of pleasure. To embrace our Lord Jesus, to dwell in His love, and be fully assured of union with Him - this is all in all. Dear reader, you need not try other forms of life in order to see whether they are better than the Christian’s: if you roam the world around, you will see no sights like a sight of the Saviour’s face; if you could have all the comforts of life, if you lost your Saviour, you would be wretched; but if you win Christ, then should you rot in a dungeon, you would find it a paradise; should you live in obscurity, or die with famine, you will yet be satisfied with favour and full of the goodness of the Lord.
2. "My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year" by J.H.Jowett
John 15:8-17
8 "In this my Father is glorified, that you bear much fruit; and so you will be my disciples.
9 Even as the Father has loved me, I also have loved you. Remain in my love.
10 If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love; even as I have kept my Father's commandments, and remain in his love.
11 I have spoken these things to you, that my joy may remain in you, and that your joy may be made full.
12 "This is my commandment, that you love one another, even as I have loved you.
13 Greater love has no one than this, that someone lay down his life for his friends.
14 You are my friends, if you do whatever I command you.
15 No longer do I call you servants, for the servant doesn't know what his lord does. But I have called you friends, for everything that I heard from my Father, I have made known to you.
16 You didn't choose me, but I chose you and appointed you, that you should go and bear fruit, and that your fruit should remain; that whatever you will ask of the Father in my name, he may give it to you.
17 "I command these things to you, that you may love one another.
THE LORD AS A FRIEND
"Ye are my friends!"
In my Lord's friendship there is the ministry of sacrifice. "Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends." This great Friend is always giving His blood. It is a lasting shame when professed Christians are afflicted with spiritual anæmia. And yet we are often so fearful, so white-faced, so chicken-hearted, so averse from battle, that no one would think us to be "the soldiers of the Lord." We need blood. "Except ye drink my blood ye have no life."
And in my Lord's friendship there is the privilege of most intimate communion.
"All things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you." He takes us into His confidence, and tells us His secrets. It is His delight to lift the veil, and give us constant surprises of love and grace. He discovers flowers in desert places, and in the gloom He unbosoms "the treasures of darkness." He is a Friend of inexhaustible resource, and His companionship makes the pilgrim's way teem with interest, and abound in the wonders of redeeming grace.
3. "Yet Another Day - A Prayer for Every Day of the Year" by John H.Jowett
December 2nd.
God of glory,may some of the light of Thy glory shine through me! May my poor life be transfigured by Thine indwelling!
May all the issues of my life be children of light! May all my days minister to the honour of my God!
4. "The Cheque Book of the Bank of Faith" by C.H.Spurgeon.
I have set the Lord always before me: because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.
Psalms 16:8
This is the way to live. With God always before us, we shall have the noblest companionship, the holiest example, the sweetest consolation, and the mightiest influence. This must be a resolute act of the mind. "I have set," and it must be maintained as a set and settled thing. Always to have an eye to the Lord's eye, and an ear for the Lord's voice - this is the right state for the godly man. His God is near him, filling the horizon of his vision, leading the way of his life, and furnishing the theme of his meditation. What vanities we should avoid, what sins we should overcome, what virtues we should exhibit, what joys we should experience if we did indeed set the Lord always before us! Why not?
This is the way to be safe. The Lord being ever in our minds, we come to feel safety and certainty because of his being so near. He is at our right hand to guide and aid us; and hence we are not moved by fear, nor force, nor fraud, nor fickleness. When God stands at a man's right hand, that man is himself sure to stand. Come on, then, ye foemen of the truth! Rush against me like a furious tempest, if ye will. God upholds me. God abides with me. Whom shall I fear?
5. "The Morning Message" by G.Campbell Morgan.
This is my beloved Son ... hear ye him.
Matthew 17:5
To many there comes no mount of transfiguration, but there is for all the speech of the Son. If the majority are not called to some mount of vision where they may behold the glory as the three men beheld it, yet to every soul amid the multitudes of the redeemed He speaks in every passing day. God forbid that the babel of earth's voices should drown the accents of His still small voice.
6. "An Evening Meditation" taken from "Searchlights from the Word" by G.Campbell Morgan.
Of whom a man is overcome, of the same is he also brought into bondage.
2 Peter 2:19
This is a truth which is insisted upon in all the Biblical revelation. Paul had given it equally clear expression when in writing to the Romans he had said: "Know ye not, that to whom ye present yourselves as servants unto obedience, his servants ye are whom ye obey; whether of sin unto death, or of obedience unto righteousness" (6:16). It is nevertheless a truth which man is slow to believe. It simply means that the freedom of the will is strictly limited. I am free to choose my master. I am not free when I have chosen. I become the servant of that master. It is possible for a man to yield to sin, but in such yielding he becomes the servant of that sin. It is impossible for any man to treat sin as completely under his control, to be indulged in at his will, and to be laid aside at his will. Yielding is yielding, and that means submission, bending of the neck, being compelled to obey the commands of sin. The only way of freedom from the mastery of sin, is that of escape therefrom through submission to Christ; and that submission must be more than an act, it must be an attitude maintained, or else we shall be "entangled" again in "the defilements of the world," and so our last state will become worse than the first. This is a truth which humbles the soul and leaves no room for pride of will. But it is the truth which, being recognized and obeyed, makes us free from the dominion of sin. In the uttermost abandonment of ourselves to the Lord, there is perfect deliverance from the power of sin; but in no other way shall we ever be any other than slaves of sin.
Note: To the best of our knowledge we are of the understanding that the above material, all published before 1926 and freely available elsewhere on the internet in various formats, is in the public domain.