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TFTD - February 2018


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01 February 2018

 

"Our salvation depends in the first instance on God seeing that which was not secret, nor done in secret. This principle was shown on Passover night: “When he seeth the blood upon the lintel, and on the two side posts, the Lord will pass over the door, and will not suffer the destroyer to come in unto your houses to smite you” (Exodus 12:23), Moses told Israel as they prepared for the Exodus. The atonement made for us by Christ with his shed blood is our shield of righteousness in the Almighty’s presence. This is why we can only draw nigh to God through him.
 
Those who draw nigh in full assurance of faith now, will find that besides God seeing them, they themselves will see God. They who are Abraham’s seed—who himself rejoiced to see Christ’s day, saw it and was glad—will with faithful Abraham “See his face”. For “Blessed are the pure in heart: for they shall see God” (Matthew 5:8)."
 
- Graham Smith
Thou God Seest Me (1968)
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02 February 2018

 

"There are the principles that the apostle [Paul] says are involved in being taught by Christ, and as we are taught of Christ so we are taught of God, and in this way qualify ourselves, under God’s grace, for inclusion among those immortal saints of Zion, whose essential quality is that they are taught of God."

 

- J. Carter

Taught of God (1946)
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03 February 2018

 

"It is surely quite clear that if anyone studied the world before there was life on it he could never have predicted life; if he had studied vegetation he would never have predicted animal life; if he had studied the animal world he would never have predicted human civilization and the arts; and if he had studied the selfishness of mankind he could never have predicted a life of perfect and selfless love. At each stage we reasonably trace the special activity of the Will whose purpose is the explanation of all things."

 

- William Temple

The Christadelphian Magazine (1966)
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04 February 2018

 

"... when we are in time with God’s purpose we can commit our times to Him. “My times are in thine hand”, declared the psalmist, and it can be true for us also. If we have the pattern we can leave the amount of thread to God. To change the figure, if we sow the seed we can commit the harvest to him:

 

“Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy; break up your fallow ground: for it is time to seek the Lord till he come and rain righteousness upon you” (Hosea 10:12)."

 

- Harry Tennant

Watch the Time (1960)

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05 February 2018

 

"In reading the Bible the natural tendency is for men to lay hold of just those passages which tend to confirm something that is already in the mind, while remaining strangely oblivious to all that reproves them. The stern, unbending puritans knew every passage in the Bible dealing with the destruction of the wicked. All that is severe in scripture was ready to their tongues, and they assumed as a matter of course that men who opposed them were the enemies of God. They did not pay much heed to the instruction that they so sorely needed and which might have made them fit to become Christians.

 

On the other hand, there are men and women who have a good knowledge of all that is beautiful and gentle in the New Testament but feel no interest in anything else. The result is that they have no zeal for divine things and they never even find the Faith for which Christians are required to contend.

 

If we sincerely desire to let the thought of Christ’s judgment influence our lives in this day of preparation, we must make a genuine effort to learn of him, especially in those matters that appeal to us least. It is worse than useless for the vigorous man to judge and condemn the flaccidity of one who is gentle, or for the gentle man to condemn the coarseness and brutality of the earnest fighter. We all have something to “overcome” a weakness common to all of us being a tendency to magnify the faults from which we are immune. The truculent man must learn to be meek and gentle, the gentle man must learn to be vigorous and zealous and the less they say about each other the better."

 

- I. Collyer

The Judgment of Christ (1933)

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06 February 2018

 

"Is anything too hard for the Lord?" The angel’s answer to the doubts of Sarah is also the final answer to the doubts of all whose faith finds difficulty in the idea of God’s personal intervention in human affairs. "God can! and God will!", faith declares, whether it be the birth of a child of promise against all human expectation, or the rebirth of a nation cast off for its waywardness (Jeremiah 32:17,37), or the beginning of a New Creation through a divine child born of a virgin (Luke 1:37). And Sarah’s faith in later days showed how fully she learned this lesson."

 

- H.A. Whittaker

Abraham: Father of the Faithful 

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07 February 2018

 

"We have seen that the beauty of the created world and the wonder of its myriad forms is an act of praise and worship to Him who made it all and sustains it all. The soft beauty of the rose, the scented beauty of the honeysuckle, the strong beauty of the horse, the flashing beauty of the trout, the shimmering beauty of the stars and planets, all these praise the God who made them and conceived them."

 

- Dennis Gillett

The Genius of Discipleship
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08 February 2018

 

"The books which bear the names of prophets (Isaiah to Malachi) make explicit claims to be God’s word. “The Lord hath spoken” “Thus saith the Lord” “Hear the word of the Lord”; “The word of the Lord came” are typical phrases by which the messages given through the prophets were introduced. No such explicit claim is made in connection with the historical books of the Old Testament, but a careful reading will show that such a claim is implicit in the record itself. Thus Bible history purports to be a record of God’s dealings with men, by communication and by action; of a revelation of God’s thoughts concerning men and their ways; and of actions done by God."

 

- John Carter

God’s Way (1974)

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09 February 2018

 

"There is only one God, self-existent and supreme,  Who is from everlasting to everlasting; eternal, almighty, omniscient, and everywhere present by His Spirit. He is the Creator and Sustainer of all things, the source of all life, and He overrules the affairs of mankind so that they may ultimately lead to the fulfilment of His great purpose to fill the earth with His glory. He is holy, just, and merciful. He has made His purpose known by revelation, both directly and indirectly. That purpose is to be found in the Bible, which is His word, and in which He reveals Himself to those who believe and obey it."

 

- W.H. Boulton

God-Spell (2003)

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10 February 2018

 

"If the angels of God shouted for joy when the corner stone of the earth was laid (Job 38:6,7), will they not also share in the hours of joy that will acclaim the completion of the new creation in Christ, when he who was laid as a foundation nineteen hundred years ago is revealed as the Omega as well as the Alpha of God’s plan, the foundation and headstone of God’s building?"

 

- John Carter

Prophets after the Exile 

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11 February 2018

 

"In the Gospels lame people walk with a firm step; the crippled from birth leap with joy; those born blind look upon the blue sky and the green grass with amazement. What they were is no problem to the anointed Saviour. What is past cannot be changed, but the Saviour stands between the sinner and the past sin. He is the rearguard. He is a shield against the overtaking adversary. He is a sentinel against a man’s past creeping in front of him. The New Testament words insist the old things are overa new creation, a new birth, from darkness to light, instead of the briar a myrtle tree. How things once were is no obstacle. To be thrilled by the promise is right and natural, but those who have been there and have known it by experience, understand it best. And such were some of you."

 

- Dennis Gillett

Words and Weights 

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12 February 2018  

 

"Give diligence to make your calling and election sure." The hour of judgment will assuredly come. When it does come the books are opened, the record reviewed and the balance struck. May we be so privileged ... to be among the happy throng redeemed out of every kindred and tongue and people and nation."

 

- E.W. Newman

Sunday Morning (1934)

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13 February 2018

 

"We have in the gospels those things which the Holy Spirit brought to the writers’ remembrance, the authentic account of the life of our Lord Jesus Christ, and in the Bible we have the whole counsel of God, inspired and infallible. “The counsel of the Lord standeth for ever, the thoughts of his heart to all generations” (Psalm 33:11)."

 

- G.T. Fryer

Thus Spake Jesus (1938)
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14 February 2018

 

“There is a world full of Bibles: it is the most multiplied book in existence, but we might say one of the least read or understood. We here are but nobodies preaching the Truth. It pleased God to reveal Himself unto babes and hide His wisdom from the wise and prudent, so the Lord Jesus himself tells us. What does Jesus tell us further in the chapter from Matthew’s (Matthew 5) gospel that we read? Speaking of the blessedness in store for those who will obey his commandments he says: “Blessed are the poor in spirit ... blessed are they that mourn ... the meek ... they that hunger and thirst after righteousness.”

 

That is the kind of people God requires, those who will give attention to the things written in His Word. “They shall be comforted.” “They shall inherit the earth.” “Theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” So if we follow the things here laid down for our observance we shall see that salvation finally which was all David’s desire and all his hope, and which is ours also by our knowledge of the Truth.”

 

- J.J. Mills

Genesis and the End (1944)

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15 February 2018

 

"Prophecy is history in anticipation, and history is prophecy fulfilled. Hence to God, as the efficient cause, may be ascribed all the great revolutions which have convulsed the world. Men, governments, and nations are but the instruments by which He works; how He acts upon these agents of His power is not the question; but that He doth order events, the Scriptures explicitly declare."

 

- John Thomas

God is in History (1846)

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16 February 2018

 

"The word has come into our lives, and we have not cast it away in the fire of worldly pleasure; but has the vision of the Lord high and lifted up been merely an intellectual pleasant exercise, or has it caused us to rend our garments like Josiah and acknowledge with Paul the fact that “Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief"? (1 Timothy 1:15)."

 

- J.G. Buckler

Take Heed How Ye Hear (1952)
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17 December 2018

 

"There is truly a sense in which faith embraces everything. If it is a “belief from the heart unto righteousness”, faith will express itself in conduct as it did with the Apostle. It will then lead to “patient continuance in well doing”, a persistent “sowing to the Spirit”, a keeping of the body under and “bringing it into subjection”, a working out of salvation “with fear and trembling”, a zeal for all good works. The fruit of the Spirit will follow such faith; love, long-suffering, gentleness, meekness. If one who puts the emphasis on belief can develop a faith so dynamic and practical as this, he will do well. He will be following the Apostle James, showing his faith by his works."

 

- Islip Collyer

Called to be Saints
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18 February 2018

"A natural fruit consists of substance to protect and disseminate the seed it nourishes. "The fruit of the spirit is love, joy, peace, long-suffering, gentleness, faith, meekness" (Galatians 5:22-23). Such fruit, the embodiment of wisdom and the ripening of experience, shines in aged godly persons as the scarlet hip on the winter thorn. What of the seed nourished by such fruit? The seed is hope of the life to come. Age without hope is pitiable and desperate, for desperation is deprivation of hope. Age with hope cherishes an incorruptible seed."

- C.A. Macdonald
Age and its Fruit (1949)
 

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19 February 2018

 

"If we now have rightly valued the revealed righteousness of God in Christ; if we have rightly estimated the sufferings of Christ for us, “the just for the unjust”; if we have rightly recognised, as he pointed out, that those who would follow him must take up his cross and share his suffering in identifying themselves with him; then we shall be of that seed which he shall see, when he sees the travail of his soul; and we shall be among those who will “declare his righteousness” as his immortal associates in the age to come."

 

- J. Carter

The Psalm of Suffering (1941)   

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20 February 2018

 

"In the Mount Olivet prophecy Jesus was concerned with the end of all things, heralded by his coming. He closed the prophecy with this exhortation:

 

“Watch ye therefore and pray always, that ye may be accounted worthy to escape all these things that shall come to pass and to stand before the Son of Man” (Luke 21:36)."

 

- H. Jenkins

Watch unto Prayer (1966)

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21 February 2018

 

"Perfect knowledge of God can only be obtained by those who eventually become partakers of the Divine nature, and share the life of God in the very fullest sense. But we today by our way of life, can illustrate that we are growing in that knowledge. It is the only effective way of declaring our desire for eternal life, for if we have developed no abiding traits of character then in effect we are telling God that we are not really interested in the life He offers us. We might want to live for ever, but we do not want to live the life of God.

 

“Beloved, now are we the sons of God, and it doth not yet appear what we shall be: but we know that, when he shall appear, we shall be like him; for we shall see him as he is” (1 John 3:2). To have that perfect knowledge, or as John puts it, to “see him as he is”, is to be like him. It is a glorious prospect: “And every man that hath this hope in him purifieth himself, even as he is pure” (1 John 3:3)."

 

- A.D. Fifield

Do You Want Eternal Life? (1960)

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22 February 2018

 

"When we feed on the Word of the Lord; when we study the messages of the prophets; when we remember the sayings and the prayers of Jesus, we ought to realize that we are reading of things which are not only profitable for our learning, but are of a spirit which can powerfully control and transform our lives."

 

- John Marshall

Portrait of the Saint
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23 February 2018

 

"All mankind is laid at the Beautiful Gate. Few acknowledge Christ, but those who do wait in expectation as the Galilean passes by. We are all caught in his shadow, wondering what he might do for us. It is not material blessing he offers but grace in abundance for all who will respond to his command, recognising in him the Son of God. He imparts healing, refreshing; we are lifted up, our natures receive strength to leap and walk and praise God in our lives."

 

- John Morris

Not With Silver and Gold (1987)
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25 February 2018

 

"... When the apostle speaks of leaving first principles of the doctrines of Christ, and pushing on to perfection, he does not imply that when we have secured a mental grasp of these elements they require no further thought. His complaint was against those who were continually discussing, and questioning their foundations ... He desired that they should be grounded and settled on such points, in order that they might gain a knowledge of the deeper and more subtle matters he was prepared to expound to them."

 

- Islip Collyer

Conviction and Conduct

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