Ephesians 4v11-16
1 And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the
evangelists, the shepherds[b] and teachers,[c] 12 to equip the saints for the work
of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the
unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature
manhood,[d] to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that
we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about
by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful
schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way
into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and
held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is
working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.
Oswald Chambers
Suppose God tells you to do something that is
an enormous test of your common sense, totally going against it. What will you
do? Will you hold back? If you get into the habit of doing something
physically, you will do it every time you are tested until you break the habit
through sheer determination. And the same is true spiritually. Again and again
you will come right up to what Jesus wants, but every time you will turn back
at the true point of testing, until you are determined to abandon yourself to
God in total surrender. Yet we tend to say, “Yes, but— suppose I do obey God in
this matter, what about . . . ?” Or we say, “Yes, I will obey God if what He
asks of me doesn’t go against my common sense, but don’t ask me to take a step
in the dark.”
Jesus Christ demands the same unrestrained,
adventurous spirit in those who have placed their trust in Him that the natural
man exhibits. If a person is ever going to do anything worthwhile, there will
be times when he must risk everything by his leap in the dark. In the spiritual
realm, Jesus Christ demands that you risk everything you hold on to or believe
through common sense, and leap by faith into what He says. Once you obey, you
will immediately find that what He says is as solidly consistent as common
sense.
By the test of common sense, Jesus Christ’s
statements may seem mad, but when you test them by the trial of faith, your
findings will fill your spirit with the awesome fact that they are the very
words of God. Trust completely in God, and when He brings you to a new
opportunity of adventure, offering it to you, see that you take it. We act like
pagans in a crisis— only one out of an entire crowd is daring enough to invest
his faith in the character of God.
Pope John Paul II
It is Jesus that you seek when you
dream of happiness; He is waiting for you when nothing else you find satisfies
you; He is the beauty to which you are so attracted; it is He who provoked you
with that thirst for fullness that will not let you settle for compromise; it
is He who urges you to shed the masks of a false life; it is He who reads in
your heart your most genuine choices, the choices that others try to stifle. It
is Jesus who stirs in you the desire to do something great with your lives, the
will to follow an ideal, the refusal to allow yourselves to be ground down by
mediocrity, the courage to commit yourselves humbly and patiently to improving
yourselves and society, making the world more human and more fraternal.”
C T Studd
Too long have we been waiting for one another to begin! The time of
waiting is past! The hour of God has struck! War is declared! In God's Holy
Name let us arise and build! 'The God of Heaven, He will fight for us', as we
for Him. We will not build on the sand, but on the bedrock of the sayings of
Christ, and the gates and minions of hell shall not prevail against us. Should
such men as we fear? Before the world, aye, before the sleepy, lukewarm,
faithless, namby-pamby Christian world, we will dare to trust our God, we will
venture our all for Him, we will live and we will die for Him, and we will do
it with His joy unspeakable singing aloud in our hearts. We will a thousand
times sooner die trusting only our God, than live trusting in man. And when we
come to this position the battle is already won, and the end of the glorious
campaign in sight. We will have the real Holiness of God, not the sickly stuff
of talk and dainty words and pretty thoughts; we will have a Masculine
Holiness, one of daring faith and works for Jesus Christ.
Yours by His Grace
Blair Humphreys
Southport, Merseyside
20th July 2014.
