My Utmost for His Highest - June 27th - The Overshadowing Personal Deliverance

Be not afraid of their faces: for I am with thee to deliver thee, saith the Lord. - Jeremiah 1:8

    God promised Jeremiah that He would deliver him personally — “Thy life will I give unto thee for a prey. (Jeremiah 39:18)” That is all God promises His children. Wherever God sends us, He will guard our lives. Our personal property and possessions are a matter of indifference, we have to sit loosely to all those things; if we do not, there will be panic and heartbreak and distress. That is the inwardness of the overshadowing of personal deliverance.

    The Sermon on the Mount indicates that when we are on Jesus Christ’s errands, there is no time to stand up for ourselves. Jesus says, in effect, “Do not be bothered with whether you are being justly dealt with or not.” To look for justice is a sign of deflection from devotion to Him. Never look for justice in this world, but never cease to give it. If we look for justice, we will begin to grouse and to indulge in the discontent of self-pity — “Why should I be treated like this?” If we are devoted to Jesus Christ we have nothing to do with what we meet, whether it is just or unjust. Jesus says — “Go steadily on with what I have told you to do and I will guard your life. If you try to guard it yourself, you remove yourself from My deliverance.” The most devout among us become atheistic in this connection; we do not believe God, we enthrone common sense and tack the name of God on to it. We do lean to our own understanding, instead of trusting God with all our hearts (see Proverbs 3:5-6).

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 24th - Reconciling One's Self to the Fact of Sin

When I was daily with you in the temple, ye stretched forth no hands against me: but this is your hour, and the power of darkness. - Luke 22:53

    It is not being reconciled to the fact of sin that produces all the disasters in life. You may talk about the nobility of human nature, but there is something in human nature which will laugh in the face of every ideal you have. If you refuse to agree with the fact that there is vice and self-seeking, something downright spiteful and wrong in human beings, instead of reconciling yourself to it, when it strikes your life, you will compromise with it and say it is of no use to battle against it. Have you made allowance for this hour and the power of darkness, or do you take a recognition of yourself that misses out sin? In your bodily relationships and friendships do you reconcile yourself to the fact of sin? If not, you will be caught round the next corner and you will compromise with it. If you reconcile yourself to the fact of sin, you will realise the danger at once — “Yes, I see what that would mean.” The recognition of sin does not destroy the basis of friendship; it establishes a mutual regard for the fact that the basis of life is tragic. Always beware of an estimate of life which does not recognise the fact that there is sin.

    Jesus Christ never trusted human nature, yet He was never cynical, never suspicious, because He trusted absolutely in what He could do for human nature. The pure man or woman, not the innocent, is the safeguarded man or woman. You are never safe with an innocent man or woman. Men and women have no business to be innocent; God demands that they be pure and virtuous. Innocence is the characteristic of a child; it is a blameworthy thing for a man or woman not to be reconciled to the fact of sin.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

 
 
 

My Utmost for His Highest - June 23rd - Acquaintance with Grief

He is despised and rejected of men; a man of sorrows, and acquainted with grief: and we hid as it were our faces from him; he was despised, and we esteemed him not. - Isaiah 53:3

    We are not acquainted with grief in the way in which Our Lord was acquainted with it; we endure it, we get through it, but we do not become intimate with it. At the beginning of life we do not reconcile ourselves to the fact of sin. We take a rational view of life and say that a man by controlling his instincts, and by educating himself, can produce a life which will slowly evolve into the life of God. But as we go on, we find the presence of something which we have not taken into consideration, viz., sin, and it upsets all our calculations. Sin has made the basis of things wild and not rational. We have to recognize that sin is a fact, not a defect; sin is red-handed mutiny against God. Either God or sin must die in my life. The New Testament brings us right down to this one issue. If sin rules in me, God’s life in me will be killed; if God rules in me, sin in me will be killed. There is no possible ultimate but that. The climax of sin is that it crucified Jesus Christ, and what was true in the history of God on earth will be true in your history and in mine. In our mental outlook we have to reconcile ourselves to the fact of sin as the only explanation as to why Jesus Christ came, and as the explanation of the grief and sorrow in life.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 25th - Receiving One's Self in the Fires of Sorrow

 “Now is my soul troubled. And what shall I say? ‘Father, save me from this hour’? No, for this purpose I have come to this hour. Father, glorify thy name.” Then a voice came from heaven, “I have glorified it, and I will glorify it again.” The crowd standing by heard it and said that it had thundered. Others said, “An angel has spoken to him.” - John 12:27-29

    My attitude as a saint to sorrow and difficulty is not to ask that they may be prevented, but to ask that I may preserve the self God created me to be through every fire of sorrow. Our Lord received Himself in the fire of sorrow, He was saved not from the hour, but out of the hour.

    We say that there ought to be no sorrow, but there is sorrow, and we have to receive ourselves in its fires. If we try and evade sorrow, refuse to lay our account with it, we are foolish. Sorrow is one of the biggest facts in life; it is no use saying sorrow ought not to be. Sin and sorrow and suffering are, and it is not for us to say that God has made a mistake in allowing them.

    Sorrow burns up a great amount of shallowness, but it does not always make a man better. Suffering either gives me my self or it destroys my self. You cannot receive your self in success, you lose your head; you cannot receive your self in monotony, you grouse. The way to find yourself is in the fires of sorrow. Why it should be so is another matter, but that it is so is true in the Scriptures and in human experience. You always know the man who has been through the fires of sorrow and received himself, you are certain you can go to him in trouble and find that he has ample leisure for you. If a man has not been through the fires of sorrow, he is apt to be contemptuous, he has no time for you. If you receive yourself in the fires of sorrow, God will make you nourishment for other people.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 26th - Always Now

We then, as workers together with him, beseech you also that ye receive not the grace of God in vain. - 2 Corinthians 6:1

    The grace you had yesterday will not do for to-day. Grace is the overflowing favour of God; you can always reckon it is there to draw upon. “In much patience, in afflictions, in necessities, in distresses” — that is where the test for patience comes (2 Corinthians 6:4). Are you failing the grace of God there? Are you saying — “Oh, well, I won’t count this time”? It is not a question of praying and asking God to help you; it is taking the grace of God now. We make prayer the preparation for work, it is never that in the Bible. Prayer is the exercise of drawing on the grace of God. Don’t say — “I will endure this until I can get away and pray.” Pray now; draw on the grace of God in the moment of need. Prayer is the most practical thing, it is not the reflex action of devotion. Prayer is the last thing in which we learn to draw on God’s grace.

    “In stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labours” — in all these things manifest a drawing upon the grace of God that will make you a marvel to yourself and to others. Draw now, not presently. The one word in the spiritual vocabulary is Now. Let circumstances bring you where they will, keep drawing on the grace of God in every conceivable condition you may be in. One of the greatest proofs that you are drawing on the grace of God is that you can be humiliated without manifesting the slightest trace of anything but His grace.

    “Having nothing…” Never reserve anything. Pour out the best you have, and always be poor. (2 Corinthians 6:10) Never be diplomatic and careful about the treasure God gives. This is poverty triumphant.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 22nd - The Undeviating Test

For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again. - Matthew 7:2

    This statement is not a haphazard guess, it is an eternal law of God. Whatever judgment you give, it is measured to you again. There is a difference between retaliation and retribution. Jesus says that the basis of life is retribution — “with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.” If you have been shrewd in finding out the defects in others, remember that will be exactly the measure given to you. Life serves back in the coin you pay. This law works from God’s throne downwards (cf. Psalm 18:25-26).

    Romans 2:1 applies it in a still more definite way, and says that the one who criticises another is guilty of the very same thing. God looks not only at the act, He looks at the possibility. We do not believe the statements of the Bible to begin with. For instance, do we believe this statement, that the things we criticise in others we are guilty of ourselves? The reason we see hypocrisy and fraud and unreality in others is because they are all in our own hearts. The great characteristic of a saint is humility — “Yes, all those things and other evils would have been manifested in me but for the grace of God, therefore I have no right to judge.”

    Jesus says — “Judge not, that ye be not judged (Matthew 7:1)”; if you do judge, it will be measured to you exactly as you have judged. Who of us would dare to stand before God and say — “My God, judge me as I have judged my fellow men?” We have judged our fellow men as sinners; if God should judge us like that we would be in hell. God judges us through the marvellous Atonement of Jesus Christ.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 21 - The Ministry of the Interior

But ye are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, an holy nation, a peculiar people; that ye should shew forth the praises of him who hath called you out of darkness into his marvellous light; - I Peter 2:9

    By what right do we become “a royal priesthood”? By the right of the Atonement. Are we prepared to leave ourselves resolutely alone and to launch out into the priestly work of prayer? The continual grubbing on the inside to see whether we are what we ought to be generates a self-centred, morbid type of Christianity, not the robust, simple life of the child of God. Until we get into a right relationship to God, it is a case of hanging on by the skin of our teeth, and we say — “What a wonderful victory I have got!” There is nothing indicative of the miracle of Redemption in that. Launch out in reckless belief that the Redemption is complete, and then bother no more about yourself, but begin to do as Jesus Christ said — pray for the friend who comes to you at midnight, pray for the saints, pray for all men. Pray on the realisation that you are only perfect in Christ Jesus, not on this plea — “O Lord, I have done my best, please hear me.”

    How long is it going to take God to free us from the morbid habit of thinking about ourselves? We must get sick unto death of ourselves, until there is no longer any surprise at anything God can tell us about ourselves. We cannot touch the depths of meanness in ourselves. There is only one place where we are right, and that is in Christ Jesus. When we are there, then we have to pour out for all we are worth in this ministry of the interior.

My Notes

Multiple thoughts here. How is it that I am chosen and a royal priesthood? Definitely because of anything in me so never think about myself as doing that work. I am only right in Christ Jesus. Ministry starts from the interior. This is where prayer starts. And this is what our lives are to be about - listening to the Holy Spirit speak to us and tell us who we are to be praying for. 

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 20th - Have You Come to "When" Yet?

And the Lord turned the captivity of Job, when he prayed for his friends: also the Lord gave Job twice as much as he had before. - Job 42:10

    The plaintive, self-centred, morbid kind of prayer, a dead-set that I want to be right, is never found in the New Testament. The fact that I am trying to be right with God is a sign that I am rebelling against the Atonement. “Lord, I will purify my heart if You will answer my prayer; I will walk rightly if You will help me.” I cannot make myself right with God, I cannot make my life perfect; I can only be right with God if I accept the Atonement of the Lord Jesus Christ as an absolute gift. Am I humble enough to accept it? I have to resign every kind of claim and cease from every effort, and leave myself entirely alone in His hands, and then begin to pour out in the priestly work of intercession. There is much prayer that arises from real disbelief in the Atonement. Jesus is not beginning to save us, He has saved us, the thing is done, and it is an insult to ask Him to do it.

    If you are not getting the hundredfold more (Matthew 19:29), not getting insight into God’s word, then start praying for your friends, enter into the ministry of the interior. “The Lord turned the captivity of Job when he prayed for his friends.” The real business of your life as a saved soul is intercessory prayer. Wherever God puts you in circumstances, pray immediately, pray that His Atonement may be realised in other lives as it has been in yours. Pray for your friends now; pray for those with whom you come in contact now.

Mom's Notes

Job 42:10 - the word "turned" is 'made him prosperous again.' 

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

Galatians 3:24 - The Law Our Guardian

Galatians 3:24 - Therefore the Law has become our tutor to lead us to Christ, so that we may be justified by faith.

Message: The Law Our Guardian

Time: Paul wrote to the churches in southern Galatia after having a hand in starting them on his first missionary journey to Asia Minor. This is Paul at his angriest, writing to make sure the church is on the path of truth, as the church had fallen into error. He wrote the book a few months before the Jerusalem council in AD 49. 

What the Lord is Saying:

This is a verse I tried to memorize several years ago as it was a verse I was encouraged by as I spent time studying the School of Biblical Evangelism. I loved the verse, but struggled with the memorization as I have struggled memorizing it seems once I've hit about 45 in age. 

In this study of the right use of God's law, I am seeing that at the core of each person is the fact that each of us is a sinner. This study must begin with that premise as we were sinners prior to the giving of the Law. It is an important reminder in this study that sin is already on the scene and is already stirred up in people's lives. I think that is a really important distinction because this means that man's rebirth or salvation answer must have occurred before the giving of the Law. I say this because I think in civilization there is a tendency in thinking that the Law is a saving tool, often providing a measuring tool of how we are living life with the idea that how we believe we are performing against that tool or measuring rod determines our acceptance by God. 

But rather these lessons are here to remind us that our salvation is apart from the law entirely and this law simply helps us see further our need for Christ and our own insufficiency. The Laws are important and represent our standard and remind us also what we need to be doing, but it is not a saving device. 

I think one reason that the Law has an attraction to man is it is ingrained in us. That can be a good thing and that can also be deceptive. A consequence of sinning is working (toiling the land) and yet we find joy in our toils and a sense of accomplishment and in that accomplishment a sense of justification that our work is producing something good. In contrary the Gospel of Jesus Christ is a simple message of "Come to Me, all who are weary and heavy-laden, and I will give you rest." That salvation is not accomplished by me, but simply by my walking to Him and letting Him take care of the problem of sin; this is a re-training of our thinking. 

The law is not a tool of justifying me, but rather it is an instrument to bring me to Christ and show me my need for Him. And the Law is also a tool in helping us understanding that the atonement or the atoning sacrifice that occurred in Christ is the means to my salvation.  

Promise:  As John Calvin comments, "The law, in short, was nothing else than an immense variety of exercises, in which the worshippers were led by the hand to Christ."

Prayer: Lord, thank you for continuing to confirm truth into my life and continuing to show me the Story of Life and Your Story of Salvation. It is easy and that easiness is always under attack. Lord, help me know how to talk to people that are simply ingrained in the idea that righteousness comes about through man's obedience. Lord, I must admit that I get sidetracked by their thinking and with them I struggle in my conversations that seem to result in more division than greater adherence to your ways. You know me Lord, I want to keep peace and this I see at times is not good as it starts to have me be agreeable to people instead of leading them to You. I want to nourish and feed your sheep. Give me the strength to do this in the way you have called me to do this. I stay committed to You God and Love you God and am forever grateful of your forever mercy. 

Note: I follow the readings from the Tabletalk Magazine devotional, though I am a little behind and working through 2017 devotionals. 2017 is a study of key biblical doctrines celebrating the 500th year of the Reformation. The month of July is about the right use of God's Law; June was justification by faith alone; May about solus Christus - Christ Alone; April, salvation by grace alone; March, the sovereign providence of God; February, the doctrine of revelation and the various aspects of the doctrine of Scripture that sola Scriptura seeks to preserve; January, the doctrine of God.

The Restraint of the Law - the law is given for lawless, unholy, disobedient people, to restrain us from acting on our sinful thoughts. Restraint and Guilt - the law is meant to restrain Christians and non-Christians alike; so that others may see Christ. The Law's Revelation of Sin - The Law reveals sin, at times making it more desirable, and show the sin which people commit and the complete standard it expects. The Law and Our Powerlessness - We are powerless over the Law and Sin revealed. It is in Christ that we receive forgiveness and the power to resist sin.

My Utmost for His Highest - June 19th - Service of Passionate Devotion

He saith to him again the second time, Simon, son of Jonas, lovest thou me? He saith unto him, Yea, Lord; thou knowest that I love thee. He saith unto him, Feed my sheep. - John 21:16

    Jesus did not say — Make converts to your way of thinking, but look after My sheep, see that they get nourished in the knowledge of Me. We count as service what we do in the way of Christian work; Jesus Christ calls service what we are to Him, not what we do for Him. Discipleship is based on devotion to Jesus Christ, not on adherence to a belief or a creed. “If any man come to Me and hate not…, he cannot be My disciple. (Luke 14:26)” There is no argument and no compulsion, but simply — “If you would be My disciple, you must be devoted to Me.” A man touched by the Spirit of God suddenly says — “Now I see Who Jesus is,” and that is the source of devotion.

    To-day we have substituted credal belief for personal belief, and that is why so many are devoted to causes and so few devoted to Jesus Christ. People do not want to be devoted to Jesus, but only to the cause He started. Jesus Christ is a source of deep offence to the educated mind of to-day that does not want Him in any other way than as a Comrade. Our Lord’s first obedience was to the will of His Father, not to the needs of men; the saving of men was the natural outcome of His obedience to the Father. If I am devoted to the cause of humanity only, I will soon be exhausted and come to the place where my love will falter; but if I love Jesus Christ personally and passionately, I can serve humanity though men treat me as a door-mat. The secret of a disciple’s life is devotion to Jesus Christ, and the characteristic of the life is its unobtrusiveness. It is like a corn of wheat, which falls into the ground and dies, but presently it will spring up and alter the whole landscape (John 12:24).

Mom's Notes

2009 Mother's Death

My Notes

Nourish my sheep. Be devoted to God/Jesus, not to causes only He started. Be devoted to His followers. 

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 18th - Don't Think Now, Take The Road

And he said, Come. And when Peter was come down out of the ship, he walked on the water, to go to Jesus.  But when he saw the wind boisterous, he was afraid; and beginning to sink, he cried, saying, Lord, save me.  - Matthew 14:29-30

    The wind was actually boisterous, the waves were actually high, but Peter did not see them at first. He did not reckon with them, he simply recognised his Lord and stepped out in recognition of Him, and walked on the water. Then he began to reckon with the actual things, and down he went instantly. Why could not our Lord have enabled him to walk at the bottom of the waves as well as on the top of them? Neither could be done saving by recognition of the Lord Jesus.

    We step right out on God over some things, then self-consideration enters in and down we go. If you are recognising your Lord, you have no business with where He engineers your circumstances. The actual things are, but immediately you look at them you are overwhelmed, you cannot recognise Jesus, and the rebuke comes: “Wherefore didst thou doubt? (Matthew 14:31)” Let actual circumstances be what they may, keep recognising Jesus, maintain complete reliance on Him.

    If you debate for a second when God has spoken, it is all up. Never begin to say — “Well, I wonder if He did speak?” Be reckless immediately, fling it all out on Him. You do not know when His voice will come, but whenever the realisation of God comes in the faintest way imaginable, recklessly abandon. It is only by abandon that you recognise Him. You will only realise His voice more clearly by recklessness.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 17th - The Uncritical Temper

Judge not, that ye be not judged. - Matthew 7:1

    Jesus says regarding judging — Don’t. The average Christian is the most penetratingly critical individual. Criticism is a part of the ordinary faculty of man; but in the spiritual domain nothing is accomplished by criticism. The effect of criticism is a dividing up of the powers of the one criticized; the Holy Ghost is the only One in the true position to criticize, He alone is able to show what is wrong without hurting and wounding. It is impossible to enter into communion with God when you are in a critical temper; it makes you hard and vindictive and cruel, and leaves you with the flattering unction that you are a superior person. Jesus says, as a disciple cultivate the uncritical temper. It is not done once and for all. Beware of anything that puts you in the superior person’s place.

    There is no getting away from the penetration of Jesus. If I see the mote in your eye, it means I have a beam in my own. Every wrong thing that I see in you (see Matthew 7:3-5), God locates in me. Every time I judge, I condemn myself (see Romans 2:17-20). Stop having a measuring rod for other people. There is always one fact more in every man’s case about which we know nothing. The first thing God does is to give us a spiritual spring-cleaning; there is no possibility of pride left in a man after that. I have never met the man I could despair of after discerning what lies in me apart from the grace of God.

Mom's Notes

Megan and Brandon's Anniversary 2017

My Notes

Chambers I believes brings up the key words about criticism here and that is that it is difficult to do with out hurting or wounding others and it often points out the person doing the criticism as the superior individual. So we must beware of anything that puts us in this superior position. Stop having a measuring rod for people. 

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 16th - What Do You Make of This?

Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. Henceforth I call you not servants; for the servant knoweth not what his lord doeth: but I have called you friends; for all things that I have heard of my Father I have made known unto you. - John 15:13, 15

    Jesus does not ask me to die for Him, but to lay down my life for Him. Peter said — “I will lay down my life for Thy sake,” and he meant it; his sense of the heroic was magnificent. It would be a bad thing to be incapable of making such a declaration as Peter made; the sense of our duty is only realized by our sense of the heroic. Has the Lord ever asked you — “Wilt thou lay down thy life for My sake? (John 13:38)” It is far easier to die than to lay down the life day in and day out with the sense of the high calling. We are not made for brilliant moments, but we have to walk in the light of them in ordinary ways. There was only one brilliant moment in the life of Jesus, and that was on the Mount of Transfiguration; then He emptied Himself the second time of His glory, and came down into the demon-possessed valley (see Mark 9:1-29). For thirty-three years Jesus laid out His life to do the will of His Father, and, John says, “we ought to lay down our lives for the brethren. (I John 3:16)” It is contrary to human nature to do it.

    If I am a friend of Jesus, I have deliberately and carefully to lay down my life for Him. It is difficult, and thank God it is difficult. Salvation is easy because it cost God so much, but the manifestation of it in my life is difficult. God saves a man and endues him with the Holy Spirit, and then says in effect — “Now work it out, be loyal to Me, whilst the nature of things round about you would make you disloyal.” “I have called you friends.” Stand loyal to your Friend, and remember that His honour is at stake in your bodily life.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 15th - Get A Move On

In the Matter of Drudgery. And beside this, giving all diligence, add to your faith virtue; and to virtue knowledge; - 2 Peter 1:5

    You have inherited the Divine nature, says Peter (v.4), now screw your attention down and form habits, give diligence, concentrate. “Add” means all that character means. No man is born either naturally or supernaturally with character; he has to make character. Nor are we born with habits; we have to form habits on the basis of the new life God has put into us. We are not meant to be illuminated versions, but the common stuff of ordinary life exhibiting the marvel of the grace of God. Drudgery is the touchstone of character. The great hindrance in spiritual life is that we will look for big things to do. “Jesus…took a towel,…and began to wash the disciples’ feet. (see John 13:1-17)”

    There are times when there is no illumination and no thrill, but just the daily round, the common task. Routine is God’s way of saving us between our times of inspiration. Do not expect God always to give you His thrilling minutes, but learn to live in the domain of drudgery by the power of God.

    It is the “adding” that is difficult. We say we do not expect God to carry us to heaven on flowery beds of ease, and yet we act as if we did! The tiniest detail in which I obey has all the omnipotent power of the grace of God behind it. If I do my duty, not for duty’s sake, but because I believe God is engineering my circumstances, then at the very point of my obedience the whole superb grace of God is mine through the Atonement.

Mom's Notes - Elizabeth and Mike's Anniversary

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My thoughts

Chambers continues now to speak of forming habits. We are not to be passive in our faith walk with God, but diligent. And another reminder that it is in the little things that we really flourish, so don't feel the need to find something big to do for God. Like this time in the Word each day. Nothing big about it, but we need to remain consistent in it, day by day.  

My Utmost for His Highest - June 14th - Get a Move On

In the Matter of Determination. Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me. John 15:4

    The Spirit of Jesus is put into me by the Atonement, then I have to construct with patience the way of thinking that is exactly in accordance with my Lord. God will not make me think like Jesus, I have to do it myself; I have to bring every thought into captivity to the obedience of Christ. “Abide in Me” — in intellectual matters, in money matters, in every one of the matters that make human life what it is. It is not a bandbox* life.

    Am I preventing God from doing things in my circumstances because I say it will hinder my communion with Him? That is an impertinence. It does not matter what my circumstances are, I can be as sure of abiding in Jesus in them as in a prayer meeting. I have not to change and arrange my circumstances myself. With Our Lord the inner abiding was unsullied; He was at home with God wherever His body was placed. He never chose His own circumstances, but was meek towards His Father’s dispensations for Him. Think of the amazing leisure of Our Lord’s life! We keep God at excitement point, there is none of the serenity of the life hid with Christ in God about us.

    Think of the things that take you out of abiding in Christ — “Yes, Lord, just a minute, I have got this to do; Yes, I will abide when once this is finished; when this week is over, it will be all right, I will abide then.” Get a move on; begin to abide now. In the initial stages it is a continual effort until it becomes so much the law of life that you abide in Him unconsciously. Determine to abide in Jesus wherever you are placed.

Notes:

*bandbox: in Chambers’ day, a small, round box made to hold neckbands or collars for shirts; metaphorically, something small, narrow, cloistered, self-contained.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 13th - Getting There

Where the selective affinity dies and the sanctified abandon lives. And Jesus said unto them, Come ye after me, and I will make you to become fishers of men. - 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?

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 12th - Getting There

Where the self-interest sleeps and the real interest awakens. Then Jesus turned, and saw them following, and saith unto them, What seek ye? They said unto him, Rabbi, (which is to say, being interpreted, Master,) where dwellest thou? He saith unto them, Come and see. They came and saw where he dwelt, and abode with him that day: for it was about the tenth hour. - John 1:38-39

    “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. (John 1:42)” 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 to-day in some of us is not of the order of the Pharisee, but of the publican (see Luke 18:9-14). 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. (John 14:23)” Make no conditions, let Jesus be everything, and He will take you home with Him not only for a day, but for ever.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 11th - Getting There

Where the Sin and the Sorrow Cease and the Song and the Saint Commence. Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. - 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?

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 10th - The Next Best Thing To Do

Seek if you have not Found.  And I say unto you, Ask, and it shall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be opened unto you. - Luke 11:9

    “Ye ask, and receive not, because ye ask amiss. (James 4:3)” If you ask for things from life instead of from God, you ask amiss, i.e., 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. (Isaiah 55:1)” 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. (Luke 11:9) ” * “Draw nigh unto God. (James 4:8)” Knock — the door is closed, and you suffer from palpitation as you knock. * “Cleanse your hands (4:8)” — knock a bit louder, you begin to find you are dirty. * “Purify your heart (4:8)” — this is more personal still, you are desperately in earnest now — you will do anything. * “Be afflicted (4:9)” — 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 (4:10)” — 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. (Luke 11:10)”

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - June 9th - The Next Best Thing To Do

Ask if you have not Received. For every one that asketh receiveth; and he that seeketh findeth; and to him that knocketh it shall be opened. - 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. Matt. 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… (James 1:5)” 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.

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My Utmost for His Highest - 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 harbor bar, full of delight, but always moored; you have to get out through the harbor 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 fulfill your spiritual destiny, which is stated in Romans 12:1-2. It is a great deal better to fulfill 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. (I Samuel 15:22)" 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. (John 7:17)" 

 - From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My thoughts

Moorings - Lines that tie you to the dock. Don't stay in the safe place and never out on the water. Get out to the depths. Don't pause when told by God to do something. Don't plan on doing things for God; let God instruct you daily and then follow Him to do it. Knowing more is trusting more and doing more. 

My Utmost for His Highest - June 7th - Don't Slack Off

And whatsoever ye shall ask in my name, that will I do, that the Father may be glorified in the Son. - John 14:13

    Am I fulfilling this ministry of the interior? There is no snare of 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 of 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. (John 15:7)" 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 molds 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. 

- From Oswald Chambers, "My Utmost for His Highest" - Classic Edition

Highlights and Underlines are courtesy of Mom from her print edition

My thoughts

Frittered - waste little by little. 

Romans 7:14-25 - The Law and Our Powerlessness

Romans 7:14-25

14 For we know that the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh, sold into bondage to sin. 15 For what I am doing, I do not understand; for I am not practicing what I would like to do, but I am doing the very thing I hate. 16 But if I do the very thing I do not want to do, I agree with the Law, confessing that the Law is good. 17 So now, no longer am I the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me. 18 For I know that nothing good dwells in me, that is, in my flesh; for the willing is present in me, but the doing of the good is not. 19 For the good that I want, I do not do, but I practice the very evil that I do not want. 20 But if I am doing the very thing I do not want, I am no longer the one doing it, but sin which dwells in me.

21 I find then the principle that evil is present in me, the one who wants to do good. 22 For I joyfully concur with the law of God in the inner man, 23 but I see a different law in the members of my body, waging war against the law of my mind and making me a prisoner of the law of sin which is in my members. 24 Wretched man that I am! Who will set me free from the body of this death? 25 Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, on the one hand I myself with my mind am serving the law of God, but on the other, with my flesh the law of sin.

Message: The Law and Our Powerlessness

Time: Paul wrote to Rome, a city he had never visited, from the Greek city of Corinth in AD 57. He writes to a church that he believes needed to hear basic gospel doctrine. The city was a hotbed of sexual immorality and idolatry. 

What the Lord is Saying:

In some circles, the Law is the Old Covenant and since Christ came with a new covenant there is the thought that the Law does not have any relevance to us today and no place in Christian discipleship. 

Romans 7:4 gives the idea that we die to the Law through the body of Christ and in verse 6, we have been released from the law. And then also is this idea that sin itself is alive outside of the Law, as recorded in verse 9 - I was once alive apart from the Law; but when the commandment came, sin became alive and I died. 

But as always we must keep reading scripture and remember to tie principles together and look at the whole matter in context. It is not that the Law is Bad, what is bad is we are sinful creatures and the Law simply awakens us to our understanding and gives us clarity of our sin. Verse 13 says that sin produced death in me. And in verse 14 the Law is spiritual, but I am of flesh. And in verse 18 nothing good dwells in me. 

The Law simply prescribes obedience, but not the power to obey. People obey the law mostly out of a fear of punishment or consequence. I'm reminded of the radar detector that seeks to remove the notion of getting caught so that we can sin more freely. The Law cannot correct us. In verse 21 is the words that evil is present in me. 

Sin is a lifelong struggle that does not simply disappear when Christ comes into our life. The law still does not make us obey. This is really the essence of Paul's words in this passage today. Paul says that nothing good dwells in me. I want to do good, but I don't often because of that evil present in me. This should make us have more compassion on those that are Christians and yet still struggle with sin. So many do. I do. But we remain so quick to find the offense in others. Our compassion should be more centered in our lives, in my life, because the only thing that has changed is Jesus in me. Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord (v.25) we are set free from the body of this death (v. 24) from being a prisoner of the law of sin which in my members (v. 23). Jesus has freed me from the punishment and from being a prisoner to sin. This must be realized that the non-Christ bearer is a prisoner. 

Therefore, what the Law does is it reveals the death of our depravity and show us how we cannot obey it. It shines a spotlight on sin, describing it, and helping us see it more clearly and in that seeing is the inability to do it. As Paul says we go back and forth - serving the law of God, but also serving with my flesh the law of sin. Thus, we are powerless over sin. We have no power. Only God can give us this power. 

Promise: We are powerless over the Law and Sin revealed. It is in Christ that we receive forgiveness and the power to resist sin. Then daily, when we sin, and we will, we seek His forgiveness (freely given) and the grace to grow in holiness. 

Prayer: Lord, I am powerless over sin. You changed me; you set me free Jesus and I am praising You daily that I am free indeed. Your forever mercy has forever changed me. Thank you for keeping me rooted in these principles. Thank you for the freedom I have in Christ. 

Note: I follow the readings from the Tabletalk Magazine devotional, though I am a little behind and working through 2017 devotionals. 2017 is a study of key biblical doctrines celebrating the 500th year of the Reformation. The month of July is about the right use of God's Law; June was justification by faith alone; May about solus Christus - Christ Alone; April, salvation by grace alone; March, the sovereign providence of God; February, the doctrine of revelation and the various aspects of the doctrine of Scripture that sola Scriptura seeks to preserve; January, the doctrine of God.

The Restraint of the Law - the law is given for lawless, unholy, disobedient people, to restrain us from acting on our sinful thoughts. Restraint and Guilt - the law is meant to restrain Christians and non-Christians alike; so that others may see Christ. The Law's Revelation of Sin - The Law reveals sin, at times making it more desirable, and show the sin which people commit and the complete standard it expects.