FOR ME TO LIVE…

The apostle Paul says in Philippians 1:21, “For to me to live is Christ, and to die is gain.” Many there are who use various things in their life as an excuse as to why they cannot follow, serve and worship Christ. It is not so with those who have life in Christ. They too have many problems, difficulties and circumstances in which it is not easy to follow Christ. But follow Him they must for Christ is their life. There is no living apart from Him who is life itself. Christ is their Bread from on high and their living Water. They possess a life, a spiritual life, given by the Holy Spirit which must be sustained and nourished by the things of the Lord Jesus Christ. He is the life of their peace, the life of their hope, the life of their salvation and the life of their joy. To live they must worship Him as He commanded. They must search His word for the promises and truth that maintain all these things in their hearts and minds. They say with the apostle, “I am crucified with Christ: nevertheless I live; yet not I, but Christ liveth in me: and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and gave himself for me.” (Gal 2:20) Believers live because they are dead in Christ, crucified in Christ to the law, to all old associations with Adam, and to all sin. They live now in the flesh by the faith of the Son of God, by faith in the Son of God and because He, in love, gave Himself for them. This is the only way they could live legally before God’s law and justice, the only way they could live spiritually and the only way they could live eternally. All would be death apart from Christ. It is because He who took upon Himself their sin, went to the cross and died but now lives that they live. All true believers have to work, they have to care for their families and they have to deal with the afflictions and difficulties that are common to all but for them to live is Christ. We can do none of these things without the strength, aid and blessing of Christ. When all these things are past we will still live because Christ is our life. Rather than these things being excuses not to follow, serve and worship Christ, they are the reasons why we must do so! We must give Christ the preeminence, the honor and the glory in and over all things. We must make Him who is our Life the priority of our life! Only then can it be said, “For me to live is Christ and TO DIE IS GAIN!” If Christ is not our life, if for us to live is not Christ, then surely, death cannot be our gain. What is it for ME, for YOU, to live?

Gary Shepard

The desire of our soul is to thy Name, and to the remembrance of thee." - Isaiah 26:8.

How sweet and expressive is the phrase, "The desire of our soul!" How it seems to carry our feelings with it! How it seems to describe the longings and utterings of a soul into which God has breathed the spirit of grace and mercy! "The desire of our soul,"-the breathing of our heart, the longing of our inmost being; the cry, the sigh, the panting of our new nature; the heavings, gaspings, lookings, longings, pantings, hungerings, thirstings, and ventings forth of the new man of grace-all are expressed in those sweet and blessed words, "The desire of our soul!" And what a mercy it is, that there should ever be in us "the desire" of a living soul; that though the righteous dealings of God are painful and severe, running contrary to everything nature loves; yet that with all these, there should be dropped into the heart that mercy, love, and grace, which draw forth the desire of the soul toward the Name of God. This is expressed in the words that follow, "With my soul have I desired thee in the night!" If you can say no more about the work of grace upon your heart than that-can you really use these words as descriptive of feelings experienced within, "With my soul have I desired thee in the night?" Is your soul longing after the Lord Jesus Christ? Is it ever in the night season panting after the manifestation of his presence? hungering and thirsting after the dropping-in of some word from his lips, some sweet whisper of his love to your soul? These are marks of grace. The carnal, the unregenerate, the ungodly, have no such desires and feelings as these; there is nothing in their heart corresponding with "the desire of the soul" unto the Name of God. But it is the case with all the righteous; for "the desire of the righteous shall be satisfied."

J.C. Philpot

The Pharisees trusted in themselves that they were righteous & despised others. Had they truly been righteous they would not have despised others. A naked sinner can be clothed, but a sinner covered with his own righteousness must be stripped. This is always true. We must be stripped of all that has to do with self or we cannot be clothed with that which pertains to God. We are called to live by faith; we can see nothing with the eye of sense. The Lord Jesus has gone up on high, and we are told to wait patiently for His appearing. God's Word carried home to the heart in the power of the Holy Spirit is the basis of confidence in all things: temporal and spiritual, present and future. He tells us of Christ's completed sacrifice. We by grace believe and commit our souls to the efficacy thereof, and we know we shall never be disappointed.

Scott Richardson

DOCTRINAL SERMONS

Much is said in regard to preaching Christ, and not doctrine. But how is it possible to preach Christ apart from doctrine? Christ is not an abstraction, but a living, personal Being. If, then, we preach him, we must preach His divinity, His humanity, and His mediatorship between God and man. If we preach what he has done, we must declare His humiliation, His death, and the atonement he has therein made for sin. If we preach Him as He is, we must proclaim His enthronement in Heaven, His intercession with the Father, and His Headship of the church, with all the laws and ordinances he has instituted for it. And if we preach Him as He shall be, we must affirm the final triumph of His Gospel, His second coming, the resurrection and the judgment, and the glory to which He will raise His people with Himself. It is not possible to preach Christ apart from doctrine; for His incarnation and vicarious death presuppose the fall and depravity and guilt of men, and the need of regeneration, justification, and sanctification; and his resurrection and glorification of the church. All doctrines of Scripture thus center in Christ, and we preach Him only as we preach them. Here, therefore is the true power of the pulpit. Only as the sermon lodges these great truths in the soul is it a living force for the salvation of men. They constitute the sole foundation of genuine experience and practical appeal.

Hezekiah Harvey 1821-1893