Stand Still

                                                
Exo 14:13  And Moses said unto the people, Fear ye not, stand still, and see the salvation of the LORD, which he will shew to you to day: for the Egyptians whom ye have seen to day, ye shall see them again no more for ever.

These words contain God's command to the believer when he is reduced to great straits and brought into extraordinary difficulties. 

He cannot retreat; he cannot go forward; he is shut upon the right hand and on the left. 

What is he now to do?

The Master's word to him is "stand still." 

It will be well for him if, at such times, he listens only to his Master's word, for other and evil advisers come with their suggestions. 

Despair whispers, "Lie down and die; give it all up." 

But God would have us put on a cheerful courage, and even in our worst times, rejoice in His love and faithfulness.

Cowardice says, "Retreat; go back to the worldling's way of action; you cannot play the Christian's part; it is too difficult. Relinquish your principles."

But, however much Satan may urge this course upon you, you cannot follow it, if you are a child of God. 

His Divine command has bid thee go from strength to strength, and so thou shalt, and neither death nor hell shall turn thee from thy course. 

What if for a while thou art called to stand still; yet this is but to renew thy strength for some greater advance in due time.

Haste cries, "Do something; stir yourself; to stand still and wait is sheer idleness." 

We must be doing something at once--we must do it, so we think-instead of looking to the Lord, who will not only do something, but will do everything.

Presumption boasts, "If the sea be before you, march into it, and expect a miracle." 

But faith listens neither to Presumption, nor to Despair, nor to Cowardice, nor to Haste, but it hears God say, "Stand still," and immovable as a rock it stands.

"Stand still"-keep the posture of an upright man, ready for action, expecting further orders, cheerfully and patiently awaiting the directing voice...

And it will not be long ere God shall say to you, as distinctly as Moses said it to the people of Israel, "Go forward."

"Be quiet! why this anxious heed About thy tangled ways?

God knows them all. 

He giveth speed And He allows delays.

Tis good for thee to walk by faith And not by sight.

Take it on trust a little while.

Soon shalt thou read the mystery aright In the full sunshine of His smile.

In times of uncertainty, wait. 

Always, if you have any doubt, wait. 

Do not force yourself to any action. 

If you have a restraint in your spirit, wait until all is clear, and do not go against it.

GOD Has Closed The Door To The "Old Creation"!

                                                                            

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Heb 3:13  But exhort one another daily, while it is called Today; lest any of you be hardened through the deceitfulness of sin.

We talk about our motives, and we say, "Our motive was right!" 

We talk about our conscientiousness, we talk about our intentions...

But you and I do not know what lies behind what we call our good motives. 

There is a deceitfulness about this human heart that defies our greatest attempt at tracking it down, and we shall never do it.... 

Here is where the church has become such a confused thing, and such a tragedy...

For the Prevailing Idea is that if you give yourself over to God He will take you up and use you...

Bring over your humanity and consecrate it to the Lord...

Consecrate your old man to the Lord, and go out and serve the Lord, with a consecrated old man...

It is Utterly Contrary to the Teaching of God’s Word!

The result is that in the work of God all the world over you have people serving the Lord in the energy of the flesh...

In the reasoning of the flesh...

In the emotions of the flesh...

Meet them, counter them, frustrate them, and you meet something evil...

You meet with a fight, a division, a schism, a scattering, and wholesale resignations.

Do you see what a havoc the enemy can make in that which is called the church?...

Because people with best intentions and purest motives have come to serve the Lord with all their own intelligence, their own strength, and their own emotion...

They have not seen that God has closed the door to the old creation...

And that God’s attitude is this: "The only thing that can satisfy Me, that can serve Me is My Son...

And if you are going to come into My service, He has to be the energy of everything, the Life of everything, the Wisdom of everything!

He has to be the governing, ruling reality in everything. 

It is not to be a matter of your impulses, but of His urgings and leadings by the Holy Spirit...

Not your sitting down to reason out what it would be good to do for the Lord...

What ought to be done...

What needs to be done...

But what He shows you, nothing more.... 

You and I must not bring over our old creation and give it to God, expecting God to use it. 

God begins with birth. 

The church of the firstborn is something quite new, and it comes out of a death. 

That death is the death of an old creation... 

And the resurrection is of something that is not the resuscitation of an old creation...

But the resurrection of something wholly of God.

~T. Austin Sparks

The NAME To Use

                                                                                        
John 14:14  If ye shall ask any thing in my name, I will do it.

What a wide promise! Anything! 

Whether large or small, All my needs are covered by that word Anything. 

Come, my soul, be free at the mercy seat, and hear thy LORD saying to thee, "Open thy mouth wide, and I will fill it." 

What a wise promise! 

We are always to ask in the Name of Jesus. 

While this encourages us, it also honors Him. 

This is a constant plea. 

Occasionally every other plea is darkened, especially such as we could draw from our own relation to God or our experience of His grace;...

But at such times the name of Jesus is as Mighty at the throne as ever, and we may plead it with Full Assurance. 

What an instructive prayer! 

I may not ask for anything to which I cannot put Christ's Hand and Seal.

I dare not use my LORD's name to a Selfish or Willful petition. 

I may only use my LORD's name to prayers which He would Himself pray if He were in my case. 

It is a high privilege to be authorized to ask in the Name of Jesus as if Jesus Himself asked...

But our love to Him will never allow us to set that name where He would not have set it. 

Am I asking for that which Jesus Approves? 

Dare I put His seal to my prayer? 

Then I Have that which I Seek of the Father.

~Charles Spurgeon

Don't Rush!

                                                   
What shall the believer do in times of darkness - the darkness of perplexity and confusion, not of heart but of mind? 

Times of darkness come to the faithful and believing disciple who is walking obediently in the will of God; seasons when he does not know what to do, nor which way to turn.

The sky is overcast with clouds. 

The clear light of Heaven does not shine upon his pathway. 

One feels as if he were groping his way in darkness.

Beloved, is this you? 

What shall the believer do in times of darkness?

Listen! 

Let him trust in the name of the Lord, and rely upon his God.

The first thing to do is do nothing. 

This is hard for poor human nature to do. 

In the West there is a saying that runs thus, "When you're rattled, don't rush"...

In other words, "When you don't know what to do, don't do it."

When you run into a spiritual fog bank, don't tear ahead...

Slow down the machinery of your life. 

If necessary, anchor your bark or let it swing at its moorings. 

We are to simply trust God. 

While we trust, God can work. 

Worry prevents Him from doing anything for us. 

If our minds. are distracted and our hearts distressed; if the darkness that overshadows us strikes terror to us; if we run hither and yon in a vain effort to find some way of escape out of a dark place of trial, where Divine providence has put us, the Lord can do nothing for us.

The peace of God must quiet our minds and rest our hearts. 

We must put our hand in the hand of God like a little child, and let Him lead us out into the bright sunshine of His love.

He knows the way out of the woods. 

Let us climb up into His arms, and trust Him to take us out by the shortest and surest road.

~Dr. Pardington

Remember we are never without a pilot when we know not how to steer.

Hold on, my heart, in thy believing-The steadfast only wins the crown...

He who, when stormy winds are heaving, Parts with its anchor, shall go down...

But he who Jesus holds through all, Shall stand, though Heaven and earth should fall.

Hold out! There comes an end to sorrow...

Hope from the dust shall conquering rise...

The storm foretells a summer's morrow...

The Cross points on to Paradise...

The Father Reigneth! Cease All Doubt;

Blessed Are They That Wait For Him!

We hear a great deal about waiting on God. 

There is, however, another side. 

When we wait on God, He is waiting till we are ready; 

When we wait for God, we are waiting till He is ready.

There are Some People Who Say, and many more who believe, that as soon as we meet all the conditions, God will answer our prayers...

They say that God lives in an eternal now; with Him there is no past nor future...

And that if we could fulfill all that He requires in the way of obedience to His will, immediately our needs would be supplied, our desires fulfilled, our prayers answered.

There is much truth in this belief, and yet it expresses only one side of the truth. 

While God lives in an eternal now, yet He works out His purposes in time. 

A petition presented before God is like a seed dropped in the ground. 

Forces above and beyond our control must work upon it, till the true fruition of the answer is given. 

~The Still Small Voice

I longed to walk along an easy road, And leave behind the dull routine of home, Thinking in other fields to serve my God;

But Jesus said, "My time has not yet come."

I longed to sow the seed in other soil, To be unfettered in the work, and free, To join with other laborers in their toil;

But Jesus said, "'Tis not My choice for thee."

I longed to leave the desert, and be led To work where souls were sunk in sin and shame, That I might win them; 

But the Master said, "I have not called thee, publish here My name." 

I longed to fight the battles of my King, Lift high His standards in the thickest strife; 

But my great Captain bade me wait and sing Songs of His conquests in my quiet life. 

I longed to leave the uncongenial sphere, Where all alone I seemed to stand and wait, To feel I had some human helper near...

But Jesus bade me guard one lonely gate.

I longed to leave the round of daily toil, Where no one seemed to understand or care; 

But Jesus said, "I choose for thee this soil, That thou might'st raise for Me some blossoms rare." 

And now I have no longing but to do At home, or else afar, His blessed will, To work amid the many or the few; 

Thus, "choosing not to choose," my heart is still. 

~Selected

The Most High Dwelleth Not In Temples Made With Hands

                                                                                    
                   

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Act 7:48  Howbeit the most High dwelleth not in temples made with hands; as saith the prophet,

Christianity has become a tremendous buildup of things which were not at the beginning. 

The Christianity which we know today is a very complicated thing. 

The hands of men have come upon the things of God, and men have tried to build this great thing according to their own judgment. 

And so we have all the confusion, all the divisions, and all the complications. 

It is really hard going in Christianity. 

Christianity has become its own great hindrance.... 

You will go about this country, you will go about this city, and you will see these great religious buildings with a cross at the top. 

And when people enter those buildings, they bow themselves; they look very reverent. 

And they think that this is a sacred building. 

If you interfere with anything there, it is called sacrilege. 

To God that is all nonsense. 

It does not mean anything at all. 

The only thing that matters to God is not the wonderful building and all the wonderful things inside the building, and not even the cross on the top. 

The one thing that matters to God is whether He is there. 

Is God Himself present in this place?

But what about ourselves, we hear Christians who come into a meeting like this speaking about coming into the house of God. 

Perhaps they say when they are going to this meeting place, "I am going to the house of God." 

And when they pray, they say, "We are very glad to be in the house of God this morning; it is a good thing to be in the Lord's house."

What makes any place the house of God? 

What makes this place sacred? 

If it is sacred at all, what makes it sacred? 

It is not the building, this is not a sacred building. 

It is not a congregation gathered here. 

The only thing that makes it sacred is that the Lord is present. 

The Lord is not interested in our places or in our congregations;

He is only concerned that He may find a place for Himself where He may be present in pleasure. 

I wonder where the tabernacle in the wilderness is now? 

I expect it is buried somewhere deep under the earth. 

I wonder where the great temple of Solomon is now?

I think you would be wasting your time to try and find it. 

You see, God had buried those things.... 

Everything that is not of Christ is going to be dissolved. 

Make no mistake. 

This whole structure of Christianity is going to be tested according to Christ. 

Christianity is just going to be tested as to how far it was the work of the Holy Spirit of God according to Christ.

~T. Austin Sparks

What The LORD Is Doing Will Not Allow For ANY Neutrality!

Luke 12:49  I am come to send fire on the earth; and what will I, if it be already kindled?

Luke 12:50  But I have a baptism to be baptized with; and how am I straitened till it be accomplished!

Luke 12:51  Suppose ye that I am come to give peace on earth? I tell you, Nay; but rather division:

If you and I are going to be men and women of the Spirit, we are not going to have an easy time. 

Hell will see to that. 

At once the clash arises...

And it is true that the more the Holy Spirit is able to have His way in us...

And to lead us into all the will of God...

The more we find this opposition, this antagonism. 

And it not only comes between us and the world...

It sometimes comes in the circle of the Lord's own people. 

It is inevitable provocation. 

You wonder why, sometimes. 

As you read the New Testament you wonder, What is the matter with these people? 

Why should they be so upset and so annoyed? 

And why should it be so spontaneous, this thing? 

And persistent; so unreasonable?" but there it is. 

There is the fact. It is inevitable.

You see, this thing that the Lord came to do and is doing, will not allow for any neutrality. 

It is going to be one thing or the other. 

It is going to be for or against. 

The eyes of flame (here the fire comes in again) the eyes of flame will not allow lukewarmness or anything that is of the Laodicean character. 

The fire is a positive element always, and it will create positive situations. 

If everything is all just nice and quiet, no disturbance, no trouble and no antagonism and opposition, you have reason to question whether the Holy Spirit is doing much...

Because He does aim at such a positiveness, which is a very, very costly thing.

It is either with the Lord, or not with the Lord, and there is nothing between. 

It is going to come out sooner or later and be precipitated. 

Now, the Lord says that is what He came to do. 

This is not an accident, a chance or things having gone wrong or miscarried. 

This is exactly what He came to do...

To scatter fire on the earth and these are the inevitable effects of the fire. 

They are going to work out.

~T. Austin Sparks

In GOD Not Out Of Trouble

                                                                                  

Jer 45:5  And seekest thou great things for thyself? seek them not: for, behold, I will bring evil upon all flesh, saith the LORD: but thy life will I give unto thee for a prey in all places whither thou goest.

A promise given for hard places, and a promise of safety and life in the midst of tremendous pressure, a life "for a prey." 

It may well adjust itself to our own times, which are growing harder as we near the end of the age, and the Tribulation times.

What is the meaning of "a life for a prey"?

It means a life snatched out of the jaws of the destroyer, as David snatched the lamb from the lion. 

It means not removal from the noise of the battle and the presence of our foes; but it means a table in the midst of our enemies, a shelter from the storm, a fortress amid the foe, a life preserved in the face of continual pressure: 

Paul's healing when pressed out of measure so that he despaired of life; Paul's Divine help when the thorn remained, but the power of Christ rested upon him and the grace of Christ was sufficient.

Lord, give me my life for a prey, and in the hardest places help me today to be victorious.

~Days of Heaven upon Earth

We often pray to be delivered from calamities; we even trust that we shall be...

But we do not pray to be made what we should be, in the very presence of the calamities...

To live amid them, as long as they last, in the consciousness that we are, held and sheltered by the Lord, and can therefore remain in the midst of them, so long as they continue, without any hurt.

For forty days and nights, the Saviour was kept in the presence of Satan in the wilderness, and that, under circumstances of special trial, His human nature being weakened by want of food and rest. 

The furnace was heated seven times more than it was wont to be heated, but the three Hebrew children were kept a season amid its flames as calm and composed in the presence of the tyrant's last appliances of torture, as they were in the presence of himself before their time of deliverance came. 

And the livelong night did Daniel sit among the lions, and when he was taken up out of the den, "no manner of hurt was found upon him, because he believed in his God."

They dwelt in the presence of the enemy, because they dwelt in the presence of God.

If We Were Directing The Affairs Of Our Own Lives!

We often think we could do better, if we were Directing the affairs of our Own lives.  

We think we could get more happiness and greater good out of life, if things were in Our hands.

We would at once Eliminate all that is Painful and Unpleasant in our lot.

We would have only Prosperities, with No Adversities; only Joys, with No Sorrows.

We would Exclude all Pain and Trouble from our life.

Our days would all be Sunny with Blue skies, and No Clouds or Storms.

Our paths would all be Soft and Easy, and Strewn With Flowers - Without thorns or any Rough places.

Would we not be Happier if we could Direct our own affairs - and Leave Out the Painful, the Bitter, the Adverse, and the Sorrowful?

So most of us would probably say at first, before we have thought of the question deeply and looked on to the end.

But really the greatest Misfortune that could come to us in this world would be to have the Direction of the affairs, and the Shaping of the experiences of our lives, put into our Own hands!

We have No Wisdom to know what is Best for ourselves.

Today is not all of life...

There is a long future, perhaps many years in this world, and then immortality hereafter.

What would give us greatest Pleasure today, might work us Harm in days to come.

Present Gratification might Cost us untold Loss and Hurt in the future.

We want Pleasure, Plenty, and Prosperity...

But perhaps we Need Pain, Self-denial, and the Giving Up of things that we Greatly Prize.

We Shrink from Suffering, from Sacrifice, from struggle...

But perhaps these are the Very Experiences which will do the Most Good for us...

Which will best mature our Christian graces...

Which will fit us for the largest service to God and man.

We should always remember that the object of living in this present world is not merely...

To have unlimited pleasure and comfort...

To get along with the Least trouble,...

To Gather the most we can of the World's Treasures...

To win the brightest fame...

No we are here to grow into the beauty of Christ, and to do the portion of God's will that belongs to us!

There is something wonderfully inspiring in the thought, that God has a Plan and a Purpose for our lives, for each life.

We do not come Drifting into this world, and do not drift through it like waves on the ocean.

We are sent from God, each one of us with a Divine plan for his life-something God wants us to do, some place He wants us to fill. 

All through our lives, we are in the Hands of God, who Chooses our place and Orders our circumstances, and Makes all things Work Together for Our Good—and His Glory. 

It is the highest honor that could be conferred upon us, to occupy such a place in the Thought of God.

We cannot doubt that His way for us is better than ours, since He is infinitely wiser than we are and loves us so. It may be painful and hard—but in the pain and the hardness, there is blessing.

Of course we may not know all the reasons there are in the divine mind, for the pains and sufferings that come into our lives, or what God's design for us in these trials is. 

Yet without discovering any reasons at all, however, we may still Trust God, who Loves us with an Infinite Love, and whose Wisdom also is Infinite!

When we get to Heaven, we shall know that God has made No Mistake in anything He has done for us, however He may have Broken into our Plans, and Spoiled our Pleasant dreams!

It should be Reason for Measureless Gratitude, that our lives are not in our own poor foolish hands - but in the Hands of our Infinitely Wise and Loving Father!

Psa 31:15  My times are in thy hand: deliver me from the hand of mine enemies, and from them that persecute me.

~J. R. Miller

If You Want to Be Victorious - Hold On

 

For just as our Heavenly Father does we Win our Victories by Holding To It.

We Conquer, Not in any brilliant fashion...

We Conquer by Continuing. 

We master shorthand when we stick to shorthand. 

We master Shakespeare when we stick to Shakespeare. 

Wandering cattle are lean kine, whether they pasture in Britain or in Beulah. 

A certain Radiant and Quiet doggedness has been one of the Marks of all the saints, for whom the trumpets have sounded on the other side. 

In the log-book of Columbus there is one entry more common than all others...

It is not "Today the wind was favorable."

It is "Today we sailed on."

And to sail on, every Common day, through fog and storm, and with mutiny on board, is the one way to the country of our dreams. 

Days come when everything seems Doubtful, when the Vision of the unseen is very dim. 

Days come when we begin to wonder if there can be a loving God at all. 

My dear reader, Hold To It. 

Continue Trusting. 

Keep On Keeping On. 

It is thus that Christian character is built. 

It is thus the "Well done" is heard at last.

~George Morrison

The Importance Of Abiding At All Times

Luke 9:62  And Jesus said unto him, No man, having put his hand to the plough, and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God. 

We see that with peculiar clearness when we meditate on the great word Abide. 

That was one of the favorite words of Jesus. 

With those deep-seeing eyes of His He has discerned the wonder of the vine-branch. 

The branch was there-abiding in the vine-not only in the sunny days of vintage. 

It was there when shadows fell... 

And when the dawn was icy...

And when the day was colorless and cloudy...

And when the storm came sweeping down the glen. 

Through all weathers...

Through every change of temperature... 

Through tempest and through calm...

The branch was there. 

Night did not sever that Intimate Relationship. 

Winter did not end that Vital Union. 

And our Lord recognized that...

As in the world of nature this is the secret and the source of fruitfulness...

So is it also in the world of Grace. 

To Abide is not to Trust merely...

Abide is to Continue Trusting...

It is to Hold To It...

And Hold To Him...

Through Summer and Winter...

Through Fair and Stormy weather...

Nothing could better show the Master's Vision of the Great and Heavenly Grace of Holding To It...

Than His Love for that great word Abide.

~George Morrison

If We Don't Believe GOD We Cannot Enter Into The Rest Of GOD!!!

We have no right to go to the unsaved and bid them come to Christ and find rest Until And Unless We Ourselves Know That Rest. 

Our testimony and our ministry is Jeopardized, Weakened, Limited and Discredited IF We Are Not Ourselves In Rest...

And This Is The Object of the Enemy's Activity in this matter...

To Discredit us by Taking From Us that very Birthright Of Our Union With Him Who is Never Perturbed, Never Anxious, Never In Doubt as to the issue, the One Who Reigns. 

You see, rest is the practical outworking of our belief that He is Lord...

And the Very Lordship of Christ is Struck at by the Unrest of the people of God....

Do not think that it is necessarily such-and-such things that account for our condition. 

These may be contributing factors, they may be very testing, may bear upon us very heavily. 

Physical matters – yes, they do press, they do make the situation exceedingly difficult, they do make a difference. 

Circumstances in which we have to live our lives, they do make a lot of difference, they make the situation exceedingly difficult. 

We say, "If only the Lord would deal with this physical matter or these circumstances or this something else!"

It is all due to that, that is the cause of it, the reason for it...

That is our way of reasoning, but it is not the Lord's thought at all. 

The thing is Deeper Down than that, and it is simply a matter of Believing God; Resolute Faith, Confidence In God. 

The Lord is trying to get us out of our variable and varying soul life where we are at the Mercy of all our Feelings, Thoughts and Reasonings and all that kind of thing...

Into a realm where, in Spirit, we are Steadfast. 

That is the point upon which it is all fixed in the Psalm. "Their heart was not steadfast with Him"...

Psa 78:37  For their heart was not right with him, neither were they stedfast in his covenant. 

And around that the whole of their forty years is gathered. 

The Key To This Is Spiritual...

Tested by Every other line, Every other means, it is a Spiritual Matter Ultimately. 

To be Strengthened with Might by His Spirit in the Inward man is the Answer to it all.

Eph 3:16  That he would grant you, according to the riches of his glory, to be strengthened with might by his Spirit in the inner man; 

~T. Austin Sparks

He Humbled Himself And Was Obedient Unto Death!

Php 2:8  And being found in fashion as a man, he humbled himself, and became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.

One of the Hardest things for a Lofty and Superior nature is to be under Authority...

To Renounce his own will, and to take a place of subjection. 

But Christ took upon Him the form of a servant...

Gave up His independence...

His right to please Himself...

His liberty of choice, and after having from eternal ages known only to command, gave Himself up Only To Obey.

I have seen occasionally the man who was once a wealthy employer a clerk in the same store. 

It was not an easy or graceful position, I assure you.

But Jesus was such a Perfect servant that His Father said: "Behold, My Servant in whom My soul delighteth."

All His life His watchword was, The Son of Man Came To Minister.

I am among you as He that doth serve.

I can do nothing of Myself.

Not My will, but Thine, be done.

Have You, Beloved, Learned The Servant's Place?

And once more, "He became obedient unto death, even the death of the cross." 

His life was all a Dying, and at last He gave All up to death, and also shame, the death of crucifixion. 

This last was the Consummation of His love.

~A. B. Simpson

Take Heed Don't Be Deceived!

Mat 24:4  And Jesus answered and said unto them, Take heed that no man deceive you. 

Mat 24:5  For many shall come in my name, saying, I am Christ; and shall deceive many.

In a somewhat extended life and ministry, again and again I have seen dear people of God who were out in the open going on with the Lord in the liberty of the Spirit with great promise and then they’ve been caught in some “ism.” 

They simply are helpless to escape themselves from the tenets of that “ism.” 

Again and again I’ve seen it! 

Tragedy...

There’s a great “ism” sweeping right over America and over Europe in these last years. 

I can dare to mention this one, well I’m going to at any rate: Universalism. 

It’s an “ism” which has captured multitudes! 

And you just can’t get anywhere with these people once they’ve got it. 

But I have known them, oh so promising...

So promising and then this thing has come subtly along their way, attractive and fascinating...

So appealing: everybody, ultimately, including the devil himself, will be saved. 

What are you going to do with that? 

Willy-nilly they’ll be saved...Undercutting so many of the Very Vitals of the Gospel.

You may call these things gross errors and they are...

But there are things that are not such errors. 

Not such errors, indeed in themselves they’re quite true, but they have become the beginning of all and the end of all to the people who have taken them on. 

You can get no further, no further. 

They have lost the great ground, the vast ground of God’s full purpose for this dispensation and become stuck on some thing that is only partial at best. 

Arrested...like Judaism; come to a standstill, or going round and round in a circle, the circle of this particular thing. 

It should be a Warning to us because, you see, this is the thing that has been the enemy of the fullness of Christ all through the centuries - this sort of thing....

There are many antichrists in the world and an antichrist is not a spurious, fearful creature, you know, with a tail and a pitchfork. 

No, an antichrist is something that assumes the place of Christ.... 

And with the Natural Judgment, Natural Powers, you are Not able to Distinguish between the True and the False. 

The Christ and the antichrist Seem to be so much alike. 

You can’t Discern the difference, but the Anointing will tell you! 

The Anointing which you have received, when you come into touch with something false, will tell you if the Anointing is really governing...

Saying, “Be careful,” not in words, but inside. 

You have a feeling there’s something not quite clear here, not transparent here, not safe here... 

I don’t feel happy about this, I can’t tell you why but I just don’t feel quite happy about this... 

There’s something in me that says: Beware.

I am convinced that in a day like this of Deceptions and Misleadings and all that... 

The Great Need is our Spiritual Discernment...

Of knowing the Holy Spirit in this way, that He’s able to Warn you.

~T. Austin Sparks

GODS Authority Overrules The Authority Of Darkness

Mal 3:6  For I am the LORD, I change not; therefore ye sons of Jacob are not consumed.

The authority of darkness is a very real thing to us. 

We have experiences, and if we were to capitulate to them, that would be the end of us. 

He tries to bring upon us that impingement of the authority of darkness...

And if we surrender to it, capitulate to it, accept it, we are beaten. 

If we are the Lord's, Christ is within, and Christ is supreme...

And we must go on even if we have no feeling, or if we have a very bad feeling...

When it seems to be the last thing we ought to be saying, we say it because it is God's fact...

And when we begin to affirm God's fact we win through.

Believers know what it is for the enemy to try to make them accept the authority of darkness. 

Stand upon the truth of God. 

God does not change with our feelings. 

God does not alter with our consciousness. 

This whole life of ours is subject to variation more swift than the variation of weather...

But He rules, unalterable, unchangeable.

He is "the same yesterday, and today, and for ever." 

And if He is there within, He has come to stay, and victory is in faith...

Believing that, standing on that, holding to that...

And we must carry that through to its final and full issue, that He is Lord of all, "Head of all principality and power."

Satan will sometimes try to make us believe that he is in the place of ascendancy, the place of supremacy,...

But since Calvary he is not, we stand there.

~T. Austin Sparks

The Hand Of The LORD Hath Done This!

Job 12:9  Who knoweth not in all these that the hand of the LORD hath wrought this?

Several years ago there was found in an African mine the most magnificent diamond in the world's history. 

It was presented to the King of England to blaze in his crown of state. 

The King sent it to Amsterdam to be cut. 

It was put into the hands of an expert lapidary. 

And what do you suppose he did with it?

He took the gem of priceless value, and cut a notch in it. 

Then he struck it a hard blow with his instrument, and lo! 

The superb jewel lay in his hand cleft in twain. What recklessness!  What wastefulness! What criminal carelessness!

Not so. 

For days and weeks that blow had been studied and planned. 

Drawings and models had been made of the gem. 

Its quality, its defects, its lines of cleavage had all been studied with minutest care. 

The man to whom it was committed was one of the most skillful lapidaries in the world.

Do you say that blow was a mistake? 

Nay. It was the most important part of the lapidary's skill. 

When he struck that blow, he did the one thing which would bring that gem to its most perfect shapeliness, radiance, and jeweled splendor. 

That blow which seemed to ruin the superb precious stone was, in fact, its perfect redemption. 

For, from those two halves were wrought the two magnificent gems which the skilled eye of the lapidary saw hidden in the rough, uncut stone as it came from the mine.

So, sometimes, God lets a stinging blow fall upon your life. 

The blood spurts. The nerves wince. The soul cries out in agony.

The blow seems to you an appalling mistake. 

But it is not, for you are the most priceless jewel in the world to God. 

And He is the most skilled lapidary in the universe.

Some day you are to blaze in the diadem of the King. 

As you lie in His hand now He knows just how to deal with you. 

Not a blow will be permitted to fall upon your shrinking soul but that the love of God permits it, and works out from its depths, blessing and spiritual enrichment unseen, and unthought of by you.

--J.H. McC. 

In one of George MacDonald's books occurs this fragment of conversation: "I wonder why God made me," said Mrs. Faber bitterly. "I'm sure I don't know what was the use of making me!"

"Perhaps not much yet," said Dorothy, "but then He hasn't done with you yet."

He is making you now, and you are quarreling with the process.

If men would but believe that they are in process of creation, and consent to be made...

Let the Maker handle them as the potter the clay, yielding themselves in resplendent motion and submissive, hopeful action with the turning of His wheel...

Then they would ere long find themselves able to welcome every pressure of that hand on them, even when it was felt in pain...

And sometimes not only to believe but to recognize the Divine end in view, the bringing of a son unto glory. 

Not a single shaft can hit, Till the God of love sees fit.