August 11, 2013

Fellowship Dinner today. Everyone please stay! No Service tonight.

But Now

There is none that understandeth.
There's none righteous, no, not one.
There's none that seeketh after God.
Out of the way they are gone.
Unprofitable, they're become.
There are none good, no, not one.
No good thing could be said of me.
Hope in myself, there is none.

But now, the righteousness of God
Is by faith of God's dear Son,
Delivered for our offenses;
There's now no condemnation!
Justified freely by His grace
Through the redemption in Christ,
Whom God set forth, the atonement,
Our just God now justifies.

Where is boasting that men could make?
Man is justified by faith.
For by grace are we saved through faith.
Tis the gift of God's sure grace.
Who shall condemn God's own people?
It is Christ who died for them.
Who shall separate from His love?
(More than conquerors in Him)

By Gary Spreacker

(Tune: Brethren, We Have Met to Worship Pg.15)

Anything God says once demands attention. Anything He says twice demands our most intent attention. How then if He says something three times.

This demands our keenest concentration, contemplation, assimilation, and even memorization.

- James Boice

~~~ O ~~~

The Word of God declares that "every man at his best state is altogether vanity." (Psalm 39:5) The Scriptures also teach that "Christ is all." (Col. 3:11) We may paraphrase what David and Paul stated in these passages by saying that man is nothing and Christ is everything. Those who would proclaim that man is more than nothing, who say, "He is something," must therefore cease to say that Christ is everything. For to the degree you make man to be more than nothing, to that exact degree you make Christ to be less than everything. And man cannot be something if Christ is everything. But if Christ is everything, and He is, man must therefore be nothing, and he is.

- Pastor Jim Byrd

~~~ O ~~~

Election is not the cause of anybody going to hell, for election is unto salvation. (2 Thessalonians 2:13) Neither is non-election responsible for the damnation of sinners. Sin is the thing that sends men to hell, and all men are sinners by nature and practice; sinners altogether apart from election or non-election. It does not follow that because election is unto salvation that non-election is unto damnation. Sin is the damning element in human life, election harms nobody.

- C.D. Cole

Is not the bee as well contented with feeding on the dew, or sucking from a flower, as the ox that grazeth on the mountains? Contentment lies within a man, in the heart; and the way to be comfortable is not by having our barrels filled, but our minds quieted. The contented man (saith Seneca) is the happy man -discontent robs a man of the power to enjoy what he possesses. A drop or two of vinegar will sour a whole glass of wine.

- Thomas Watson

~~~ O ~~~

That was a touching story which Mr. Gladstone gave in Parliament, when announcing the death of the Princess Alice. Her little boy was ill with diphtheria, and the mother had been cautioned not to inhale the poisoned breath. The child was tossing in the delirium of fever. The Princess stood beside him and laid her hand on his brow to caress him. The touch cooled the fevered brain, and brought back the wandering soul from its wild delirium. He nestled a moment in his mother's lap; then, throwing his arms around her neck, he whispered, "Mamma, kiss me." Mother-love was stronger than all the injunctions of physicians--and she pressed her lips to the child's. The result was her death.

You say that she was foolish. Yet where is the mother who would not have done the same? Love stops at no peril, at no sacrifice. There was great peril in Christ's own mission to this world. In His marvelous love for us, He put his lips to the poison of our sin--and died in our place!

"Christ loved the church, and gave Himself for it." Ephesians 5:25 "I am the Good Shepherd. The Good Shepherd gives His life for the sheep!" John 10:11