Daily Bible Notes: November, 21st
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
Grieve not the Holy Spirit.
Ephesians 4:30
All that the believer has must come from Christ, but it comes solely through the channel of the Spirit of grace. Moreover, as all blessings thus flow to you through the Holy Spirit, so also no good thing can come out of you in holy thought, devout worship, or gracious act, apart from the sanctifying operation of the same Spirit. Even if the good seed be sown in you, yet it lies dormant except He worketh in you to will and to do of His own good pleasure. Do you desire to speak for Jesus - how can you unless the Holy Ghost touch your tongue? Do you desire to pray? Alas! what dull work it is unless the Spirit maketh intercession for you! Do you desire to subdue sin? Would you be holy? Would you imitate your Master? Do you desire to rise to superlative heights of spirituality? Are you wanting to be made like the angels of God, full of zeal and ardour for the Master’s cause? You cannot without the Spirit - "Without me ye can do nothing." O branch of the vine, thou canst have no fruit without the sap! O child of God, thou hast no life within thee apart from the life which God gives thee through His Spirit! Then let us not grieve Him or provoke Him to anger by our sin. Let us not quench Him in one of His faintest motions in our soul; let us foster every suggestion, and be ready to obey every prompting. If the Holy Spirit be indeed so mighty, let us attempt nothing without Him; let us begin no project, and carry on no enterprise, and conclude no transaction, without imploring His blessing. Let us do Him the due homage of feeling our entire weakness apart from Him, and then depending alone upon Him, having this for our prayer, "Open Thou my heart and my whole being to Thine incoming, and uphold me with Thy free Spirit when I shall have received that Spirit in my inward parts."
Evening
Lazarus was one of them that sat at the table with Him.
John 12:2
He is to be envied . It was well to be Martha and serve, but better to be Lazarus and commune. There are times for each purpose, and each is comely in its season, but none of the trees of the garden yield such clusters as the vine of fellowship. To sit with Jesus, to hear His words, to mark His acts, and receive His smiles, was such a favour as must have made Lazarus as happy as the angels. When it has been our happy lot to feast with our Beloved in His banqueting-hall, we would not have given half a sigh for all the kingdoms of the world, if so much breath could have bought them. He is to be imitated . It would have been a strange thing if Lazarus had not been at the table where Jesus was, for he had been dead, and Jesus had raised him. For the risen one to be absent when the Lord who gave him life was at his house, would have been ungrateful indeed. We too were once dead, yea, and like Lazarus stinking in the grave of sin; Jesus raised us, and by His life we live - can we be content to live at a distance from Him? Do we omit to remember Him at His table, where He deigns to feast with His brethren? Oh, this is cruel! It behoves us to repent, and do as He has bidden us, for His least wish should be law to us. To have lived without constant intercourse with one of whom the Jews said, "Behold how He loved him," would have been disgraceful to Lazarus, is it excusable in us whom Jesus has loved with an everlasting love? To have been cold to Him who wept over his lifeless corpse, would have argued great brutishness in Lazarus. What does it argue in us over whom the Saviour has not only wept, but bled? Come, brethren, who read this portion, let us return unto our heavenly Bridegroom, and ask for His Spirit that we may be on terms of closer intimacy with Him, and henceforth sit at the table with Him.
2. "My Daily Meditation for the Circling Year" by J.H.Jowett
1 Kings 8:1-21
1 Then Solomon assembled the elders of Israel, with all the heads of the tribes, the princes of the fathers' households of the children of Israel, to king Solomon in Jerusalem, to bring up the ark of the LORD's covenant out of David's city, which is Zion.
2 All the men of Israel assembled themselves to king Solomon at the feast, in the month Ethanim, which is the seventh month.
3 All the elders of Israel came, and the priests picked up the ark.
4 They brought up the LORD's ark, the Tent of Meeting, and all the holy vessels that were in the Tent. The priests and the Levites brought these up.
5 King Solomon and all the congregation of Israel, who were assembled to him, were with him before the ark, sacrificing sheep and cattle, that could not be counted or numbered for multitude.
6 The priests brought in the ark of the LORD's covenant to its place, into the inner sanctuary of the house, to the most holy place, even under the cherubim's wings.
7 For the cherubim spread their wings out over the place of the ark, and the cherubim covered the ark and its poles above.
8 The poles were so long that the ends of the poles were seen from the holy place before the inner sanctuary; but they were not seen outside. They are there to this day.
9 There was nothing in the ark except the two stone tablets which Moses put there at Horeb, when the LORD made a covenant with the children of Israel, when they came out of the land of Egypt.
10 It came to pass, when the priests had come out of the holy place, that the cloud filled the LORD's house,
11 so that the priests could not stand to minister by reason of the cloud; for the LORD's glory filled the LORD's house.
12 Then Solomon said, "The LORD has said that he would dwell in the thick darkness.
13 I have surely built you a house of habitation, a place for you to dwell in forever."
14 The king turned his face around, and blessed all the assembly of Israel; and all the assembly of Israel stood.
15 He said, "Blessed is the LORD, the God of Israel, who spoke with his mouth to David your father, and has with his hand fulfilled it, saying,
16 'Since the day that I brought my people Israel out of Egypt, I chose no city out of all the tribes of Israel to build a house, that my name might be there; but I chose David to be over my people Israel.'
17 "Now it was in the heart of David my father to build a house for the name of the LORD, the God of Israel.
18 But the LORD said to David my father, 'Whereas it was in your heart to build a house for my name, you did well that it was in your heart.
19 Nevertheless, you shall not build the house; but your son who shall come out of your body, he shall build the house for my name.'
20 The LORD has established his word that he spoke; for I have risen up in the place of David my father, and I sit on the throne of Israel, as the LORD promised, and have built the house for the name of the LORD, the God of Israel.
21 There I have set a place for the ark, in which is the LORD's covenant, which he made with our fathers, when he brought them out of the land of Egypt."
THE EARLY BUILDERS
It is always a healthy means of grace to link my own accomplishments with the fidelity and achievements of the past. Solomon traced his finished Temple to the holy purpose in the heart of David his father. I lay the coping-stone, but who turned the first sod? I lead the water into new ministries, but who first dug the well?
There is the temple of liberty. In our own day we are enriching it with most benignant legislation, but we must not forget our dauntless fathers, in whose blood the foundations were laid. When I am walking about in the finished structure, let me remember the daring architects who "did well" to have it in their hearts.
Such retrospect will make me humble. It will save me from the isolation and impotence of foolish pride. It will confirm me in human fellowship by showing me how many springs I have in my fellow-men.
And such retrospect will make me grateful to my God. Noble outlooks always engender the spirit of praise. The fine air of wide spaces quickens the soul to a song.
3. "Yet Another Day - A Prayer for Every Day of the Year" by John H.Jowett
November 21st.
God of all grace, wilt Thou give me some gift of Thy grace? I myself would gracious be. Take away all roughness and
harshness of manner. Give me the loving heart and the gentle touch. May I be able to heal the wounds of men by the soft grace of divine consolation!
4. "The Cheque Book of the Bank of Faith" by C.H.Spurgeon.
Look unto me, and be ye saved, all the ends of the earth: for I am God, and there is none else.
Isaiah 45:22
This is a promise of promises. It lies at the foundation of our spiritual life. Salvation comes through a look at him who is "a just God and a Saviour." How simple is the direction! "Look unto me." How reasonable is the requirement! Surely the creature should look to the Creator. We have looked elsewhere long enough, it is time that we look alone to him who invites our expectation, and promises to give us his salvation.
Only a look! Will we not look at once? We are to bring nothing in ourselves, but to look outward and upward to our Lord on his throne, whither he has gone up from the cross. A look requires no preparation, no violent effort: it needs neither wit nor wisdom, wealth nor strength. All that we need is in the Lord our God, and if we look to him for everything, that everything shall be ours, and we shall be saved.
Come, far-off ones, look hither! Ye ends of the earth, turn your eyes this way! As from the furthest regions men may see the sun and enjoy his light, so you who lie in death's borders at the very gates of hell may by a look receive the light of God, the life of heaven, the salvation of the Lord Jesus Christ, who is God, and therefore able to save.
5. "The Morning Message" by G.Campbell Morgan.
Be ye doers of the word, and not hearers only.
James 1:22
The Lordship of Christ is the doctrinal fact which is the centre of all others; the Lordship of Christ is the practical fact which is the issue of the doctrine. Doctrine and duty are wedded in the scheme of Christianity. Every doctrine has its expression in some duty; all creed has its out-blossoming in character.
6. "An Evening Meditation" taken from "Searchlights from the Word" by G.Campbell Morgan.
He cometh to judge the earth.
Psalms 96:13
In these words another great song of praise rises to its climax. This is the reason for the exultant joy which thrills through every line of it. Let this be pondered. There are ways in which it is right to think of the coming of God in judgment with awe and trembling; but we have been prone to associate the terrors of the Divine judgment in some of its methods so closely with the fact of that judgment, as to be at least in danger of forgetting other of its methods, and its intention. In this song we are reminded of the glory and greatness, of the honour and majesty, of the strength and beauty of God, and of the fact that such a God judges in equity. The result of the judging of the earth by this God will be that the heavens rejoice, and the earth is glad. God governs the earth with righteousness, and the people with His truth. This must inevitably mean that He proceeds against all unrighteousness and unrighteous men with wrath; and that all that is false, and all liars, He smites with destruction. But the fierceness of His wrath, the weight of His stroke, are inspired by His love of man, and His determination to establish that order of life in which strength and beauty shall abound, and all weakness and ugliness be for ever banished. In our worship we must ever praise Him for His mercy, and principally because in its exercise there is no violation of justice; and we must praise Him for all the terrors of His anger, for they are inspired by His love.
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.