ECT "My Utmost for His Highest". . . . . Oswald Chambers

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May 25th

The test of self-interest

"If thou wilt take the left hand, then I will go to the right; or if thou depart to the right hand, then I will go to the left." Genesis 13:9.

As soon as you begin to live the life of faith in God, fascinating and luxurious prospects will open up before you, and these things are yours by right; but if you are living the life of faith you will exercise your right to waive your rights, and let God choose for you. God sometimes allows you to get into a place of testing where your own welfare would be the right and proper thing to consider if you were not living a life of faith; but if you are, you will joyfully waive your right and leave God to choose for you. This is the discipline by means of which the natural is transformed into the spiritual by obedience to the voice of God.

Whenever right is made the guidance in the life, it will blunt the spiritual insight. The great enemy of the life of faith in God is not sin, but the good which is not good enough. The good is always the enemy of the best. It would seem the wisest thing in the world for Abraham to choose, it was his right, and the people around would consider him a fool for not choosing. Many of us do not go on spiritually because we prefer to choose what is right instead of relying on God to choose for us. We have to learn to walk according to the standard which has its eye on God. “Walk before Me.”

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

May 26th

Think as Jesus taught

"Pray without ceasing." 1 Thess. 5:17.

We think rightly or wrongly about prayer according to the conception we have in our minds of prayer. If we think of prayer as the breath in our lungs and the blood from our hearts, we think rightly. The blood flows ceaselessly, and breathing continues ceaselessly; we are not conscious of it, but it is always going on. We are not always conscious of Jesus keeping us in perfect joint with God, but if we are obeying Him, He always is. Prayer is not an exercise, it is the life. Beware of anything that stops ejaculatory prayer. “Pray without ceasing,” keep the childlike habit of ejaculatory prayer in your heart to God all the time.

Jesus never mentioned unanswered prayer; He had the boundless certainty that prayer is always answered. Have we by the Spirit the unspeakable certainty that Jesus had about prayer, or do we think of the times when God does not seem to have answered prayer? “Every one that asketh receiveth.” We say—‘But …, but …’ God answers prayer in the best way, not sometimes, but every time, although the immediate manifestation of the answer in the domain in which we want it may not always follow. Do we expect God to answer prayer?

The danger with us is that we want to water down the things that Jesus says and make them mean something in accordance with common sense; if it were only common sense, it was not worth while for him to say it. The things Jesus says about prayer are supernatural revelations.

Oswald Chambers

 

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May 27th

The life that lives

"Tarry ye in the city of Jerusalem, until ye be endued with power from on high". Luke 24:49.

The disciples had to tarry until the day of Pentecost not for their own preparation only; they had to wait until the Lord was glorified historically. As soon as He was glorified, what happened? “Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Ghost, He hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear.” The parenthesis in John 7:39 (“For the Holy Ghost was not yet given; because that Jesus was not yet glorified”) does not apply to us; the Holy Ghost has been given, the Lord is glorified; the waiting depends not on God’s providence, but on our fitness.

The Holy Spirit’s influence and power were at work before Pentecost, but He was not here. Immediately Our Lord was glorified in Ascension, the Holy Spirit came into this world, and He has been here ever since. We have to receive the revelation that He is here. The reception of the Holy Spirit is the maintained attitude of a believer. When we receive the Holy Spirit, we receive quickening life from the ascended Lord.

It is not the baptism of the Holy Ghost which changes men, but the power of the ascended Christ coming into men’s lives by the Holy Ghost that changes them. We too often divorce what the New Testament never divorces. The baptism of the Holy Ghost is not an experience apart from Jesus Christ: it is the evidence of the ascended Christ.

The baptism of the Holy Ghost does not make you think of Time or Eternity, it is one amazing glorious NOW. “This is life eternal, that they might know Thee.”John 17:3 (KJV) Begin to know Him now, and finish never.

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

May 28th

Unquestioned revelation

"And in that day ye shall ask Me nothing." John 16:23.

When is “that day”? When the Ascended Lord makes you one with the Father. In that day you will be one with the Father as Jesus is, and “in that day,” Jesus says, “ye shall ask Me nothing.” Until the resurrection life of Jesus is manifested in you, you want to ask this and that; then after a while you find all questions gone, you do not seem to have any left to ask. You have come to the place of entire reliance on the resurrection life of Jesus which brings you into perfect contact with the purpose of God. Are you living that life now? If not, why shouldn’t you?

There may be any number of things dark to your understanding, but they do not come in between your heart and God. “And in that day ye shall ask Me no question”—you do not need to, you are so certain that God will bring things out in accordance with His will. John 14:1 has become the real state of your heart, and there are no more questions to be asked. If anything is a mystery to you and it is coming in between you and God, never look for the explanation in your intellect, look for it in your disposition, it is that which is wrong. When once your disposition is willing to submit to the life of Jesus, the understanding will be perfectly clear, and you will get to the place where there is no distance between the Father and His child because the Lord has made you one, and “in that day ye shall ask Me no question.”


Oswald Chamber

 

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May 29th

Undisturbed relationship

"At that day ye shall ask in My name … The Father Himself loveth you". John 16:26, 27.

“At that day ye shall ask in My name,” i.e., in My nature. Not—‘You shall use My name as a magic word,’ but—‘You will be so intimate with Me that you will be one with Me.’ “That day” is not a day hereafter, but a day meant for here and now. “The Father Himself loveth you”—the union is so complete and absolute. Our Lord does not mean that life will be free from external perplexities but that just as He knew the Father’s heart and mind, so by the baptism of the Holy Ghost He can lift us into the heavenly places where He can reveal the counsels of God to us.

“Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in My name …” “That day” is a day of undisturbed relationship between God and the saint. Just as Jesus stood unsullied in the presence of His Father, so by the mighty efficacy of the baptism of the Holy Ghost, we can be lifted into that relationship—“that they may be one, even as We are one.”

“He will give it you.” Jesus says that God will recognize our prayers. What a challenge! By the Resurrection and Ascension power of Jesus, by the sent-down Holy Ghost, we can be lifted into such a relationship with the Father that we are at one with the perfect sovereign will of God by our free choice even as Jesus was. In that wonderful position, placed there by Jesus Christ, we can pray to God in His name, in His nature, which is gifted to us by the Holy Ghost, and Jesus says—“Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in My name, He will give it you.” The sovereign character of Jesus Christ is tested by His own statements.

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

May 30th

“Yes—But …!”

"Lord, I will follow Thee"; but … Luke 9:61.

Supposing God tells you to do something which is an enormous test to your common sense, what are you going to do? Hang back? If you get into the habit of doing a thing in the physical domain, you will do it every time until you break the habit determinedly; and the same is true spiritually. Again and again you will get up to what Jesus Christ wants, and every time you will turn back when it comes to the point, until you abandon resolutely. ‘Yes, but—supposing I do obey God in this matter, what about …?’ ‘Yes, I will obey God if He will let me use my common sense, but don’t ask me to take a step in the dark.’ Jesus Christ demands of the man who trusts Him the same reckless sporting spirit that the natural man exhibits. If a man is going to do anything worth while, there are times when he has to risk everything on his leap, and in the spiritual domain Jesus Christ demands that you risk everything you hold by common sense and leap into what He says, and immediately you do, you find that what He says fits on as solidly as common sense. At the bar of common sense Jesus Christ’s statements may seem mad; but bring them to the bar of faith, and you begin to find with awestruck spirit that they are the words of God. Trust entirely in God, and when He brings you to the venture, see that you take it. We act like pagans in a crisis, only one out of a crowd is daring enough to bank his faith in the character of God.

Oswald Chambers

 

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May 31st

God first

Put God First in Trust. "Jesus did not commit Himself unto them, … for He knew what was in man." John 2:24–25.

Our Lord trusted no man; yet He was never suspicious, never bitter, never in despair about any man because He put God first in trust; He trusted absolutely in what God’s grace could do for any man. If I put my trust in human beings first, I will end in despairing of everyone; I will become bitter, because I have insisted on man being what no man ever can be—absolutely right. Never trust anything but the grace of God in yourself or in anyone else.

Put God’s Needs First. Lo, "I come to do Thy will, O God." Hebrews 10:9.

A man’s obedience is to what he sees to be a need; Our Lord’s obedience was to the will of His Father. The cry to-day is—‘We must get some work to do; the heathen are dying without God; we must go and tell them of Him.’ We have to see first of all that God’s needs in us personally are being met. “Tarry ye until.…” The purpose of this College is to get us rightly related to the needs of God. When God’s needs in us have been met, then He will open the way for us to realize His needs elsewhere.

Put God’s Trust First. "And whoso receiveth one such little child in My name, receiveth Me." Matthew 18:5.

God’s trust is that He gives me Himself as a babe. God expects my personal life to be a ‘Bethlehem.’ Am I allowing my natural life to be slowly transfigured by the indwelling life of the Son of God? God’s ultimate purpose is that His Son might be manifested in my mortal flesh.

Oswald Chambers

 

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June 1st

The staggering question

"Son of man, can these bones live?" Ezekiel 37:3.

Can that sinner be turned into a saint? Can that twisted life be put right? There is only one answer: ‘O Lord, Thou knowest, I don’t.’ Never trample in with religious common sense and say—‘Oh, yes, with a little more Bible reading and devotion and prayer, I see how it can be done.’

It is much easier to do something than to trust in God; we mistake panic for inspiration.That is why there are so few fellow-workers with God and so many workers for Him. We would far rather work for God than believe in Him. Am I quite sure that God will do what I cannot do? I despair of men in the degree in which I have never realized that God has done anything for me. Is my experience such a wonderful realization of God’s power and might that I can never despair of anyone I see? Have I had any spiritual work done in me at all? The degree of panic is the degree of the lack of personal spiritual experience.

“Behold, O my people, I will open your graves.” When God wants to show you what human nature is like apart from Himself, He has to show it you in yourself. If the Spirit of God has given you a vision of what you are apart from the grace of God (and He only does it when His Spirit is at work), you know there is no criminal who is half so bad in actuality as you know yourself to be in possibility. My ‘grave’ has been opened by God and “I know that in me (that is in my flesh) dwelleth no good thing.” God’s Spirit continually reveals what human nature is like apart from His grace.

Oswald Chambers

 

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June 2nd

What are you haunted by?

"What man is he that feareth the Lord?" Psalm 25:12.

What are you haunted by? You will say—‘By nothing,’ but we are all haunted by something, generally by ourselves, or, if we are Christians, by our experience. The Psalmist says we are to be haunted by God. The abiding consciousness of the life is to be God, not thinking about Him. The whole of our life inside and out is to be absolutely haunted by the presence of God. A child’s consciousness is so mother-haunted that although the child is not consciously thinking of its mother, yet when calamity arises, the relationship that abides is that of the mother. So we are to live and move and have our being in God, to look at everything in relation to God, because the abiding consciousness of God pushes itself to the front all the time.

If we are haunted by God, nothing else can get in, no cares, no tribulation, no anxieties. We see now why Our Lord so emphasized the sin of worry. How can we dare be so utterly unbelieving when God is round about us? To be haunted by God is to have an effective barricade against all the onslaughts of the enemy.

“His soul shall dwell at ease.” In tribulation, misunderstanding, slander, in the midst of all these things, if our life is hid with Christ in God, He will keep us at ease. We rob ourselves of the marvellous revelation of this abiding companionship of God. “God is our Refuge”—nothing can come through that shelter.

Oswald Chambers

 

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June 3rd

The secret of the Lord

"The secret (friendship R.V.) of the Lord is with them that fear Him." Psalm 25:14.

What is the sign of a friend? That he tells you secret sorrows? No, that he tells you secret joys. Many will confide to you their secret sorrows, but the last mark of intimacy is to confide secret joys. Have we ever let God tell us any of His joys, or are we telling God our secrets so continually that we leave no room for Him to talk to us? At the beginning of our Christian life we are full of requests to God, then we find that God wants to get us into relationship with Himself, to get us in touch with His purposes. Are we so wedded to Jesus Christ’s idea of prayer—“Thy will be done”—that we catch the secrets of God? The things that make God dear to us are not so much His great big blessings as the tiny things, because they show His amazing intimacy with us; He knows every detail of our individual lives.

“… him shall He teach in the way that He shall choose.” At first we want the consciousness of being guided by God, then as we go on we live so much in the consciousness of God that we do not need to ask what His will is, because the thought of choosing any other will never occur to us. If we are saved and sanctified God guides us by our ordinary choices, and if we are going to choose what He does not want, He will check, and we must heed. Whenever there is doubt, stop at once. Never reason it out and say—‘I wonder why I shouldn’t?’ God instructs us in what we choose, that is, He guides our common sense, and we no longer hinder His Spirit by continually saying—‘Now, Lord, what is Thy will?’

Oswald Chambers

 

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June 4th

The never-failing God

"For He hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee." Hebrews 13:5.

What line does my thought take? Does it turn to what God says or to what I fear? Am I learning to say not what God says, but to say something after I have heard what He says? “He hath said, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee. So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.”

“I will in no wise fail thee”—not for all my sin and selfishness and stubbornness and waywardness. Have I really let God say to me that He will never fail me? If I have listened to this say-so of God’s, then let me listen again.

“Neither will I in any wise forsake thee.” Sometimes it is not difficulty that makes me think God will forsake me, but drudgery. There is no Hill Difficulty to climb, no vision given, nothing wonderful or beautiful, just the commonplace day in and day out—can I hear God’s say-so in these things?

We have the idea that God is going to do some exceptional thing, that He is preparing and fitting us for some extraordinary thing by and by, but as we go on in grace we find that God is glorifying Himself here and now, in the present minute. If we have God’s say-so behind us, the most amazing strength comes, and we learn to sing in the ordinary days and ways.

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

June 5th

God’s say-so

"He hath said … so that we may boldly say" … Hebrews 13:5–6.

My say-so is to be built on God’s say-so. God says—“I will never leave thee,” then I can with good courage say—“The Lord is my helper, I will not fear”—I will not be haunted by apprehension. This does not mean that I will not be tempted to fear, but I will remember God’s say-so. I will be full of courage, like a child ‘bucking himself up’ to reach the standard his father wants. Faith in many a one falters when the apprehensions come, they forget the meaning of God’s say-so, forget to take a deep breath spiritually. The only way to get the dread taken out of us is to listen to God’s say-so.

What are you dreading? You are not a coward about it, you are going to face it, but there is a feeling of dread. When there is nothing and no one to help you, say—‘But the Lord is my Helper, this second, in my present outlook.’ Are you learning to say things after listening to God, or are you saying things and trying to make God’s word fit in? Get hold of the Father’s say-so, and then say with good courage—“I will not fear.” It does not matter what evil or wrong may be in the way, He has said—“I will never leave thee.”

Frailty is another thing that gets in between God’s say-so and ours. When we realize how feeble we are in facing difficulties, the difficulties become like giants, we become like grasshoppers, and God becomes a nonentity. Remember God’s say-so—“I will in no wise fail you.” Have we learned to sing after hearing God’s key-note? Are we always possessed with the courage to say—“The Lord is my helper,” or are we succumbing?

Oswald Chambers

 

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June 6th

Work out what God works in

"Work out your own salvation". Phil. 2:12–13

Your will agrees with God, but in your flesh there is a disposition which renders you powerless to do what you know you ought to do. When the Lord is presented to the conscience, the first thing conscience does is to rouse the will, and the will always agrees with God. You say—‘But I do not know whether my will is in agreement with God.’ Look to Jesus and you will find that your will and your conscience are in agreement with Him every time. The thing in you which makes you say ‘I shan’t’ is something less profound than your will; it is perversity, or obstinacy, and they are never in agreement with God. The profound thing in man is his will, not sin. Will is the essential element in God’s creation of man: sin is a perverse disposition which entered into man. In a regenerated man the source of will is almighty, “For it is God which worketh in you both to will and to do of His good pleasure.” You have to work out with concentration and care what God works in; not work your own salvation, but work it out, while you base resolutely in unshaken faith on the complete and perfect Redemption of the Lord. As you do this, you do not bring an opposed will to God’s will, God’s will is your will, and your natural choices are along the line of God’s will, and the life is as natural as breathing. God is the source of your will, therefore you are able to work out His will. Obstinacy is an unintelligent ‘wadge’ that refuses to be enlightened; the only thing is for it to be blown up with dynamite, and the dynamite is obedience to the Holy Spirit.

Do I believe that Almighty God is the source of my will? God not only expects me to do His will, but He is in me to do it.

Oswald Chambers

 

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June 7th

Don’t slack off

"Whatever ye shall ask in My name, that will I do." John 14:13.

Am I fulfilling this ministry of the interior? There is no snare, or any danger of infatuation or pride in intercession, it is a hidden ministry that brings forth fruit whereby the Father is glorified. Am I allowing my spiritual life to be frittered away, or am I bringing it all to one centre—the Atonement of my Lord? Is Jesus Christ more and more dominating every interest in my life? If the one central point, the great exerting influence in my life, is the Atonement of the Lord, then every phase of My life will bear fruit for Him.

I must take time to realize what is the central point of power. Do I give one minute out of sixty to concentrate upon it? “If ye abide in Me”—continue to act and think and work from that centre—“ye shall ask what ye will, and it shall be done unto you.” Am I abiding? Am I taking time to abide? What is the greatest factor of power in my life? Is it work, service, sacrifice for others, or trying to work for God? The thing that ought to exert the greatest power in my life is the Atonement of the Lord. It is not the thing we spend the most time on that moulds us most; the greatest element is the thing that exerts most power. We must determine to be limited and concentrate our affinities.

“Whatsoever ye shall ask in My name, that will I do.” The disciple who abides in Jesus is the will of God, and his apparently free choices are God’s fore-ordained decrees. Mysterious? Logically contradictory and absurd? Yes, but a glorious truth to a saint.

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

June 8th

What next?

"Determine to know more than others. If ye know these things, happy are ye if ye do them". John 13:17.

If you do not cut the moorings, God will have to break them by a storm and send you out. Launch all on God, go out on the great swelling tide of His purpose, and you will get your eyes open. If you believe in Jesus, you are not to spend all your time in the smooth waters just inside the harbour bar, full of delight, but always moored; you have to get out through the harbour bar into the great deeps of God and begin to know for yourself, begin to have spiritual discernment.

When you know you should do a thing, and do it, immediately you know more. Revise where you have become ‘stodgy’ spiritually, and you will find it goes back to a point where there was something you knew you should do, but you did not do it because there seemed no immediate call to, and now you have no perception, no discernment; at a time of crisis you are spiritually distracted instead of spiritually self-possessed. It is a dangerous thing to refuse to go on knowing.

The counterfeit of obedience is a state of mind in which you work up occasions to sacrifice yourself; ardour is mistaken for discernment. It is easier to sacrifice yourself than to fulfil your spiritual destiny, which is stated in Romans 12:1–2 . It is a great deal better to fulfil the purpose of God in your life by discerning His will than to perform great acts of self-sacrifice. “To obey is better than sacrifice.” Beware of harking back to what you were once when God wants you to be something you have never been. “If any man will do …, he shall know.…”

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

June 9th

The next best thing to do

"Ask if you have not Received. For everyone that asketh receiveth." Luke 11:10.

There is nothing more difficult than to ask. We will long and desire and crave and suffer, but not until we are at the extreme limit will we ask. A sense of unreality makes us ask. Have you ever asked out of the depths of moral poverty? “If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God …” but be sure that you do lack wisdom. You cannot bring yourself up against Reality when you like. The next best thing to do if you are not spiritually real, is to ask God for the Holy Spirit on the word of Jesus Christ (see Luke 11:13). The Holy Spirit is the One Who makes real in you all that Jesus did for you.

“For every one that asketh receiveth.” This does not mean you will not get if you do not ask (cf. Mat. 5:45), but until you get to the point of asking you won’t receive from God. To receive means you have come into the relationship of a child of God, and now you perceive with intelligent and moral appreciation and spiritual understanding that these things come from God.

“If any of you lack wisdom …” If you realize you are lacking, it is because you have come in contact with spiritual reality; do not put your reasonable blinkers on again. People say—Preach us the simple gospel: don’t tell us we have to be holy, because that produces a sense of abject poverty, and it is not nice to feel abjectly poor. “Ask” means beg. Some people are poor enough to be interested in their poverty, and some of us are like that spiritually. We will never receive if we ask with an end in view; if we ask, not out of our poverty but out of our lust. A pauper does not ask from any other reason than the abject panging condition of his poverty, he is not ashamed to beg. Blessed are the paupers in spirit.

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

June 10th

The next best thing to do

Seek if you have not Found. “Seek, and ye shall find." Luke 11:9.

“Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss.” If you ask for things from life instead of from God, you ask amiss, that is, you ask from a desire for self-realization. The more you realize yourself the less will you seek God. “Seek, and ye shall find.” Get to work, narrow your interests to this one. Have you ever sought God with your whole heart, or have you only given a languid cry to Him after a twinge of moral neuralgia? Seek, concentrate, and you will find.

“Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye to the waters.” Are you thirsty, or smugly indifferent—so satisfied with your experience that you want nothing more of God? Experience is a gateway, not an end. Beware of building your faith on experience, the metallic note will come in at once, the censorious note. You can never give another person that which you have found, but you can make him homesick for what you have.

“Knock, and it shall be opened unto you.” “Draw nigh to God.” Knock—the door is closed, and you suffer from palpitation as you knock. “Cleanse your hands”—knock a bit louder, you begin to find you are dirty. “Purify your heart”—this is more personal still, you are desperately in earnest now—you will do anything. “Be afflicted”—have you ever been afflicted before God at the state of your inner life? There is no strand of self-pity left, but a heartbreaking affliction of amazement to find you are the kind of person that you are. “Humble yourself”—it is a humbling business to knock at God’s door—you have to knock with the crucified thief. “To him that knocketh, it shall be opened.”

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

June 11th

Getting there

Where the sin and the sorrow cease, and the song and the saint commence. "Come unto Me." Matthew 11:28.

Do I want to get there? I can now. The questions that matter in life are remarkably few, and they are all answered by the words—“Come unto Me.” Not—‘Do this, or don’t do that’; but—“Come unto Me.” If I will come to Jesus my actual life will be brought into accordance with my real desires; I will actually cease from sin, and actually find the song of the Lord begin.

Have you ever come to Jesus? Watch the stubbornness of your heart, you will do anything rather than the one simple childlike thing—“Come unto Me.” If you want the actual experience of ceasing from sin, you must come to Jesus.

Jesus Christ makes Himself the touchstone. Watch how He used the word ‘Come.’ At the most unexpected moments there is the whisper of the Lord—“Come unto Me.” and you are drawn immediately. Personal contact with Jesus alters everything. Be stupid enough to come and commit yourself to what He says. The attitude of coming is that the will resolutely lets go of everything and deliberately commits all to Him.

“and I will give you rest,” i.e., I will stay you. Not—I will put you to bed and hold your hand and sing you to sleep; but—I will get you out of bed, out of the languor and exhaustion, out of the state of being half dead while you are alive; I will imbue you with the spirit of life, and you will be stayed by the perfection of vital activity. We get pathetic and talk about ‘suffering the will of the Lord!’ Where is the majestic vitality and might of the Son of God about that?

Oswald Chambers

 

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June 12th

Getting there

Where the self-interest sleeps and the real interest awakens: Master, where dwellest Thou?… Come and see.… Come with Me. John 1:39.

“They abode with Him that day.” That is about all some of us ever do, then we wake up to actualities, self-interest arises and the abiding is passed. There is no condition of life in which we cannot abide in Jesus.

“Thou art Simon, thou shalt be called Cephas.” God writes the new name on those places only in our lives where He has erased the pride and self-sufficiency and self-interest. Some of us have the new name in spots only, like spiritual measles. In sections we look all right. When we have our best spiritual mood on, you would think we were very high-toned saints; but don’t look at us when we are not in that mood. The disciple is one who has the new name written all over him; self-interest and pride and self-sufficiency have been completely erased.

Pride is the deification of self, and this today in some of us is not of the order of the Pharisee, but of the publican. To say ‘Oh, I’m no saint,’ is acceptable to human pride, but it is unconscious blasphemy against God. It literally means that you defy God to make you a saint. ‘I am much too weak and hopeless, I am outside the reach of the Atonement.’ Humility before men may be unconscious blasphemy before God. Why are you not a saint? It is either that you do not want to be a saint, or that you do not believe God can make you one. It would be all right, you say, if God saved you and took you straight to heaven. That is just what He will do! “We will come unto Him, and make our abode with Him.” Make no conditions, let Jesus be everything, and He will take you home with Him not only for a day, but for ever.

Oswald Chambers

 

[Cross Reference]

June 13th

Getting there

Where the selective affinity dies and the sanctified abandon lives. "Come ye after Me". Mark 1:17.

One of the greatest hindrances in coming to Jesus is the excuse of temperament. We make our temperament and our natural affinities barriers to coming to Jesus. The first thing we realize when we come to Jesus is that He pays no attention whatever to our natural affinities. We have the notion that we can consecrate our gifts to God. You cannot consecrate what is not yours; there is only one thing you can consecrate to God, and that is your right to yourself (Romans 12:1). If you will give God your right to yourself, He will make a holy experiment out of you. God’s experiments always succeed. The one mark of a saint is the moral originality which springs from abandonment to Jesus Christ. In the life of a saint there is this amazing wellspring of original life all the time; the Spirit of God is a well of water springing up, perennially fresh. The saint realizes that it is God Who engineers circumstances, consequently there is no whine, but a reckless abandon to Jesus. Never make a principle out of your experience; let God be as original with other people as He is with you.

If you abandon to Jesus, and come when He says ‘Come,’ He will continue to say ‘Come’ through you; you will go out into life reproducing the echo of Christ’s ‘Come.’ That is the result in every soul who has abandoned and come to Jesus.

Have I come to Jesus? Will I come now?

Oswald Chambers