Daily Bible Notes: March, 16th
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
I am a stranger with thee.
Psalm 39:12
Yes, O Lord, with Thee, but not to Thee. All my natural alienation from Thee, Thy grace has effectually removed; and now, in fellowship with Thyself, I walk through this sinful world as a pilgrim in a foreign country. Thou art a stranger in Thine own world. Man forgets Thee, dishonours Thee, sets up new laws and alien customs, and knows Thee not. When Thy dear Son came unto His own, His own received Him not. He was in the world, and the world was made by Him, and the world knew Him not.
Never was foreigner so speckled a bird among the denizens of any land as Thy beloved Son among His mother’s brethren. It is no marvel, then, if I who live the life of Jesus, should be unknown and a stranger here below.
Lord, I would not be a citizen where Jesus was an alien. His pierced hand has loosened the cords which once bound my soul to earth, and now I find myself a stranger in the land. My speech seems to these Babylonians among whom I dwell an outlandish tongue, my manners are singular, and my actions are strange. A Tartar would be more at home in Cheapside than I could ever be in the haunts of sinners. But here is the sweetness of my lot: I am a stranger with Thee . Thou art my fellow-sufferer, my fellow-pilgrim. Oh, what joy to wander in such blessed society! My heart burns within me by the way when thou dost speak to me, and though I be a sojourner, I am far more blest than those who sit on thrones, and far more at home than those who dwell in their ceiled houses. "To me remains nor place, nor time:
My country is in every clime; I can be calm and free from care On any shore, since God is there.
While place we seek, or place we shun, The soul finds happiness in none:
But with a God to guide our way, ‘Tis equal joy to go or stay."
Evening
Keep back Thy servant also from presumptuous sins.
Psalm 19:13
Such was the prayer of the "man after God’s own heart ." Did holy David need to pray thus? How needful, then, must such a prayer be for us babes in grace! It is as if he said, "Keep me back, or I shall rush headlong over the precipice of sin." Our evil nature, like an ill-tempered horse, is apt to run away. May the grace of God put the bridle upon it, and hold it in, that it rush not into mischief. What might not the best of us do if it were not for the checks which the Lord sets upon us both in providence and in grace!
The psalmist’s prayer is directed against the worst form of sin - that which is done with deliberation and wilfulness. Even the holiest need to be "kept back" from the vilest transgressions. It is a solemn thing to find the apostle Paul warning saints against the most loathsome sins. "Mortify therefore your members which are upon the earth; fornication, uncleanness, inordinate affection, evil concupiscence, and covetousness, which is idolatry." What! do saints want warning against such sins as these? Yes, they do. The whitest robes, unless their purity be preserved by divine grace, will be defiled by the blackest spots. Experienced Christian, boast not in your experience; you will trip yet if you look away from Him who is able to keep you from falling. Ye whose love is fervent, whose faith is constant, whose hopes are bright, say not, "We shall never sin," but rather cry, "Lead us not into temptation." There is enough tinder in the heart of the best of men to light a fire that shall burn to the lowest hell, unless God shall quench the sparks as they fall. Who would have dreamed that righteous Lot could be found drunken, and committing uncleanness? Hazael said, "Is Thy servant a dog, that he should do this thing?" and we are very apt to use the same self-righteous question. May infinite wisdom cure us of the madness of self-confidence.
2. "My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year" by J.H.Jowett
John 11:46-57
46 But some of them went away to the Pharisees and told them the things which Jesus had done.
47 The chief priests therefore and the Pharisees gathered a council, and said, "What are we doing? For this man does many signs.
48 If we leave him alone like this, everyone will believe in him, and the Romans will come and take away both our place and our nation."
49 But a certain one of them, Caiaphas, being high priest that year, said to them, "You know nothing at all,
50 nor do you consider that it is advantageous for us that one man should die for the people, and that the whole nation not perish."
51 Now he didn't say this of himself, but being high priest that year, he prophesied that Jesus would die for the nation,
52 and not for the nation only, but that he might also gather together into one the children of God who are scattered abroad.
53 So from that day forward they took counsel that they might put him to death.
54 Jesus therefore walked no more openly amongst the Jews, but departed from there into the country near the wilderness, to a city called Ephraim. He stayed there with his disciples.
55 Now the Passover of the Jews was at hand. Many went up from the country to Jerusalem before the Passover, to purify themselves.
56 Then they sought for Jesus and spoke with one another as they stood in the temple, "What do you think-that he isn't coming to the feast at all?"
57 Now the chief priests and the Pharisees had commanded that if anyone knew where he was, he should report it, that they might seize him.
THE NEMESIS OF BIGOTRY
A fearful nemesis waits upon the spirit of bigotry. Oliver Wendell Holmes has said that bigotry is like the pupil of the eye, the more light you pour into it the more it contracts. The scribes and Pharisees became smaller men the more the Lord revealed His glory. In the raising of Lazarus they saw nothing of the glory of the resurrection life, nothing of the joy of the reunited family, nothing of the gracious ministry of the Lord! "Darkness had blinded their eyes."
And it is also the nemesis of bigotry to be bitter, cruel, and violent. They sought to kill the Giver of life!
It is the ministry of light to ripen and sweeten the dispositions. "The fruit of the light is in all goodness." It is the ministry of the darkness to make men sour and unsympathetic, and revengeful, and to so pervert the heart as to make it a minister of poison and death.
And yet, how powerless is bigotry in the long run! It can no more stay the progress of the Kingdom than King Canute could check the flowing tide! Bigotry slew the Lord, and He rose again! And so it ever is. "Truth crushed to earth shall rise again; the eternal years of God are hers."
3. "Yet Another Day - A Prayer for Every Day of the Year" by John H.Jowett
March 16th.
Holy God, I beseech Thee to give me a more sensitive conscience; deliver me from little sins that spoil my fellowship with Thee.
Give me freedom from secret faults.
4. "The Cheque Book of the Bank of Faith" by C.H.Spurgeon.
Those things, which ye have both learned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, do: and the God of peace shall be with you.
Philippians 4:9
It is well when a man can with advantage be so minutely copied as Paul might have been. Oh, for grace to imitate him this day and every day!
Should we, through divine grace, carry into practice the Pauline teaching, we may claim the promise which is now open before us; and what a promise it is! God, who loves peace, makes peace, and breathes peace, will be with us. "Peace be with you" is a sweet benediction; but for the God of peace to be with us is far more. Thus we have the fountain as well as the streams, the sun as well as his beams. If the God of peace be with us, we shall enjoy the peace of God which passeth all understanding, even though outward circumstances should threaten to disturb. If men quarrel, we shall be sure to be peace-makers, if the Maker of peace be with us.
It is in the way of truth that real peace is found. If we quit the faith or leave the path of righteousness under the notion of promoting peace, we shall be greatly mistaken. First pure, then peaceable, is the order of wisdom and of fact. Let us keep to Paul's line, and we shall have the God of peace with us as he was with the apostle.
5. "The Morning Message" by G.Campbell Morgan.
Glorify your Father which is in heaven.
Matthew 5:16
No tinge of brightness can you put upon the beauty of His character, no greater fulness of love can you give. How then can I glorify Him? God is glorified in the perfect realisation on the part of His people of all the gracious purposes of His love for them.
6. "An Evening Meditation" taken from "Searchlights from the Word" by G.Campbell Morgan.
He could not be hid.
Mark 7:24
The explanation of this statement is found in the story which follows, of which story it is the introduction. A mother, whose heart was wrung with anguish by reason of the suffering of her child, sought the aid of Jesus, and from such an appeal "He could not be hid." The declaration is made the more arresting by the fact that it follows the statement that He desired privacy: "He entered into a house, and would have no man know it." And yet again it is interesting in view of the method of apparent reluctance which He adopted with her. These very surroundings serve to add new emphasis and value to the declaration. May we not at once say that here incidentally we have an illustration of the very reason of the Incarnation, and all that it accomplished? From human suffering God cannot withdraw Himself. He cannot be hidden. It appeals to Him irresistibly, because of the grace of His nature. When there is no eye to pity, His eye always pities; when there is no arm to save, His arm brings salvation. Herein, and herein alone, is our hope that at last sorrow and sighing shall flee away. And, moreover, in the fact that it is God, Who is thus compelled by His nature to come to the relief of the sorrowing, is our guarantee that there will be no slight healing of our wounds. He does not deal with symptoms merely, but with the dire root of the disease. As He comes forth from His hiding-place, compelled by human agony, He comes to make no terms with that which has caused the pain; but He comes to end the pain by removing the cause.
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.