TFTD - August 2014

[Resource Manager]

01 August 2014

"So teach us to number our days, that we may get us an heart of wisdom" (Psalm 90:12). This may sound like numbering sadly the days and vicissitudes of life. This is not for the sake of sentiment but for a practical purpose. And that aim is to furnish a motive for a wiser life, to see that we have the right end in view – this end, "that we may get us an heart of wisdom", to go all out in seeking the Kingdom of God (Matthew 6:33). The real motive is the furnishing of a wiser life of the heart, the allied forces of mind and will, the inner life. The resultant illumination will transfigure the life in its character and conduct."

- Claud Lamb
So shall thy strength be (1997)

[Resource Manager]

02 August 2014

"You are my witnesses", said God of His people, and what more dramatic witness could the world have had of God’s hand than the remarkable manner in which God’s people have been restored to God’s Land? "If they hear not Moses and the prophets neither will they be persuaded though one rose from the dead." Israel has indeed risen from the dead, God has opened their graves, to use Ezekiel’s metaphor; the "dry bones" now support a body which pulsates with vitality, but the world is not persuaded, and few indeed of the Jews themselves, even the subjects of this miracle, see in it the Hand of God."

- A. Winter Moore
The Hand of God (1952)

[Resource Manager]

03 August 2014

"Only where there is the love of the Truth can there be the promise of life. How great and how perilous is that which is committed to our trust! There is no room for trifling with the truth, or trying to be different, or allowing feelings to lead us; in handling the Truth there is no place for sentimentalism, or self-assertion, or love of novelty; there is only room for reverence and intellectual humility."

- L.G. Sargent
The Love of the Truth (1951)

[Resource Manager]

04 August 2014

"As Jesus himself confirmed, our Heavenly Father does not look upon even a sparrow with the impersonal eye of an ornithologist. The tiny bird fallen in the dust means much to Him. He feels its fall, and in His heart its woe is written. And if that be so with the sparrow, how much more with the children of men, in whom His handiwork is more richly displayed (Matthew 10:29-31). Through all the trials and anguish of a restless world, God’s practical help finds its way unerringly to those who trust Him."

- C. Lamb
Goodness and Mercy (1980)

[Resource Manager]

05 August 2014

"... Faith is a virtue. It can be developed and strengthened. There is no doubt that it is based on good scriptural reasoning, but it requires diligence and training and constant attention—until it becomes a joy and a pleasure to read in Scripture, "The just shall live by faith". (Hebrews 10:38)

- Chris Brook
The Just Shall Live by Faith (1972)

 

[Resource Manager]

06 August 2014

"A gardener must not be impatient. His seed must go through the normal processes of growth. There is no fruit until the harvest and it would be foolish of him to expect it. There is good promise of it, and he can follow it with delight. So, too, is life. This time is not our inheritance. We are in process of growing until the harvest. Let us not wilt and fade away; let us not be weary in well-doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not."

- Harry Tennant
Getting Tired? (1960)

[Resource Manager]

07 August 2014

"As the Lord Jesus showed his loving concern for others, so must we, in our relationships one with another offer our understanding and love. We are all anxious and troubled, even desperately unhappy, sometimes. Being in the Truth in a world that is mentally if not physically hostile brings trials and temptations to us, as also does being imperfect among the imperfect. We all need understanding at times. From the Lord Jesus we know we can receive that understanding. He has, however, given us of his love that we may share it, first with those who long to share it also, and second with those, our brethren and sisters, who need our help along the way. For, whilst wisdom may be the principal thing, it is nothing without understanding."

- John Mitchell
Understanding (1968)

[Resource Manager]

08 August 2014

"True believers are deeply impressed by the wonders of Bible design. Their faith is renewed and fortified by the discovery of more and more evidence that the wisdom of God is wrought into the very fabric of Scripture. Just as the natural man needs a constant supply of food to keep him alive, so too the spiritual man lives by his daily bread. The Scriptures have been miraculously arranged to give an unfailing supply of spiritual strength to those who seek for it; and one of the features of Scripture that makes a great contribution to one’s spiritual sustenance is what we so often refer to as design."

- Peter Watkins
The Inspired Scriptures - Our Sure Foundation (1962)

[Resource Manager]

09 August 2014

"All the wonders God has wrought in the past and will perform in the future stem from the simple fact, expressed so succinctly by Jeremiah when directed to buy fields in an enemy-occupied country. "Ah, Lord God! Behold, thou hast made the heaven and the earth by thy great power and stretched out arm, there is nothing too hard for thee" (Jeremiah 32:17) - "too wonderful for thee" (R.V. margin)."

- Albert T. Abbotts
The Witness of Hosea and Amos (1963)

[Resource Manager]

10 August 2014

"Food and clothing are a temporary means of maintaining life: but the life to be maintained is a bigger thing than the means used to maintain it, and in the end it can only be given them by God. A straining anxiety after the means of life will not bring life but death: a sorry self-defeat! God who feeds the smallest things of His creation is to them a heavenly Father: "Seek ye first the Kingdom of God, and his righteousness: and all these things shall be added unto you" (Matthew 6:25-34)."

- L.G. Sargent
The "Blessings" of the Kingdom (1939)

[Resource Manager]

11 August 2014

"In our confidence that we “stand” in Christ, it still behoves us to “take heed lest we fall” (1 Corinthians 10:12). The one great certainty is that God will never forsake us; whether we may be tempted into forsaking Him is the point which evidently requires our vigilance."

- Fred Pearce
Exhortation and Warning (1979)

[Resource Manager]

12 August 2014

"The practical outworkings of love, and the intimate self-questionings its consideration provokes, will occupy us all our lives ... a beautiful point from Peter’s second letter. Peter, who many years earlier, had realized that he could not yet lay claim to agape, writes this letter when he is old, and says in 2 Peter 1:3, that God "has granted unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness ... exceeding great and precious promises." We have to add to our faith "virtue, knowledge, temperance, patience, godliness, brotherly kindness" ...; but his list does not stop there; to our brotherly kindness we must add "charity," love, agape. Peter realizes, perhaps with a memory of his interview with Jesus, that the climax of all spiritual virtues is love. But not only so. He says that those things must be added. If we do add them, if we do supply in addition all this, then, he goes on in 2 Peter 1:11 and he uses exactly the same word, though it is veiled in both A.V. and R.V., there will be added, there will be supplied to us, a full enjoyment of love in all its completeness. "So an entrance shall be ministered unto you abundantly into the everlasting kingdom of our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ."

- H.A. Twelves
As Touching Brotherly Love (1942)

[Resource Manager]

13 August 2014

"The Word of God was made flesh, and dwelt among men; was manifested and declared by those who companied with him during his ministry. Their witness has been preserved, and we have it ready to hand. Herein lies guidance enough to keep us in the Way: we neglect it at our peril."

- Clement E. Hinde
From Head to Heart (1997)

[Resource Manager]

14 August 2014

"Truth ... reveals to us the reality beyond the seen things. One of the difficulties of human philosophy has always been its inability to escape from the circle of its own thought and to see outside it. But God, knowing the limits of the human mind, reveals himself to man and asks him for a simple act of acceptance: “He that cometh to God must believe that he is, and that he is a rewarder of them that diligently seek him” (Hebrews 11:6). This belief in, or acceptance of, God is really the first important characteristic of the seeker after truth. But for it to be of the Truth itself, it must be a “thoroughly perceived” acceptance, and not an intellectual assent which satisfies one’s sense of form or respectability, and which leaves one feeling that one has done the right thing, and has no need to commit oneself any further."

- John Marshall
The Word of Truth (1960)

[Resource Manager]

15 August 2014

"When that call comes, whenever and however it does, it is just possible that our eternal destiny may well depend upon our instant reaction. To be apprehensive; to desire a little more time to prepare; to say in effect to the angel, 'Wait a little, please': the parables teach that there is a danger to those so minded, finding themselves knocking on a closed door. On the other hand, the reaction could and should be: "This is what I have been waiting for ever since I came to know Christ: at last he is here! This is the reality of Christ as opposed to the vanity of this world!" Such would indeed be "servants waiting for their Lord."

"Blessed are those servants, whom the Lord when he cometh shall find watching; verily I say unto you, that he shall gird himself, and make them sit down to meat, and will come forth and serve them” (Luke 12:37)."

- C.E. Hinde
Thy Kingdom Come (1988)

[Resource Manager]

16 August 2014

"Now the Book of God is peculiar in this - it narrates the past, the present, and the future all in one volume. We learn from the accuracy of its details in relation to the past and the present, to put unbounded confidence in its declarations concerning the future. In ascertaining, therefore, the ultimate design of Eternal Wisdom in the creation of all things, we turn to the end of the Bible to see what God has said shall be as the consummation of what has gone before; for what He has said shall be the permanent order of creation, must be the end He originally designed before ever the foundations of the earth were laid."

- John Thomas
The Father’s House

[Resource Manager]

17 August 2014

"May we so live and work now that when the trumpet shall sound for us, we may not be ashamed in his presence. "And the seventh angel sounded, and there were great voices in heaven, saying, The kingdoms of this world are become the kingdoms of our Lord and of his Christ: and he shall reign for ever and ever" (Revelation 11:15)."

- D.N. Wood
The Silver Trumpets (1953)

[Resource Manager]

18 August 2014

"The offer to all of a share in the good things God has provided is extended in God’s book. The conditions of faith and obedience (first in baptism and then in living for Christ) are right and divinely appropriate, and put man into the right relationship to his God, and are the gateway to many present divine blessings."

- John Carter
God's Way

[Resource Manager]

19 August 2014

"Most of the aspects of our life in the Truth can be assessed by some standards, but there is one commodity we can never have too much of. That is the love and fellowship that binds us together as a family."

- Howard Walker
Evening Meditations (1973)

[Resource Manager]

20 August 2014

 

"Just how much of the world’s distress will be shared by the saints is not known. There are hints that they will be taken away for judgement before the worst is poured out upon the nations—judgement will begin at the household. There is just a hint of this in Luke 21:28: "When these things begin to come to pass, then look up, and lift up your heads; for your redemption draweth nigh." The saints are to watch for the beginning of these things and the key thought in their minds must be “redemption” not the political liberation of Israel. There is in this a warning: we do not know how soon we shall be taken away and we must therefore be in constant readiness, not just in having an awareness of the signs, but being prepared spiritually for the judgement."

- Cyril Tennant
Take Heed to Yourselves (1991)

[Resource Manager]

21 August 2014

"The promise of the Lord is that the “pure in heart shall see God”—true in the ultimate and real sense beyond the millennium; but true also that the vision of God is the bliss we can enjoy and experience in the present life. Each day we are fitting ourselves to see God; we realize that to see Him with the literal eye in this life is impossible, yet we can see or perceive God when we enter into the fulness of the knowledge of God, because then we enter into the intimate fellowship of love. Love’s highest joy is to be in the presence of the loved one."

- Gwyn Davies
Blessed Are the Pure in Heart (1970)

[Resource Manager]

22 August 2014

"The day when we all shall meet the Doorkeeper cannot be far away. How shall we fare in that first exchange of glance? If in this life we have followed the path of humility and willing service made plain in the life of the Faithful Steward and the Doorkeeper to life eternal, breathing the constant prayer of being rather a doorkeeper in the house of the Lord than a dweller in the tents of wickedness, then we shall pass through the gates into the city with the great shout of triumph of the redeemed:
 

"Lift up your heads, O ye gates;
Even lift them up, ye everlasting doors:
And the king of glory shall come in." (Psalm 24:9)"

 

- H. Tennant

Ecclesial Servants (1961)

[Resource Manager]

23 August 2014

"God Almighty, the Ever Living, Creator of the world, Lord of the universe and Father of the only begotten. The Son, who is in the bosom of the Father, and who now sits on the light-girdled throne in heaven, because he was once for all obedient unto death. He rose from the grave and now has received all power in heaven and on earth. He is soon to burst upon the world in kingdom glory, having purged the sins of men through his own blood, shed for love’s sake. The mysterious forces through which Almighty God works His sovereign will in this world. Holy Spirit, Angels, the Word of Life, the Victory of Love. These are the unseen things and the Hebrew man says, Be absolutely certain about them and you have complete assurance about the things hoped for. Putting it simply, you prove the things of afterwards by the certainty of the present."

- Dennis Gillett
Words and Weights

[Resource Manager]

24 August 2014

 

"In a changing world, the things which make up a character pleasing to God do not change—faithfulness in service, unswerving loyalty to God’s word, diligence in our work, readiness to respond to the call of duty, albeit with humility, in the consciousness of our own insufficiency."

 

- N.L. Evans

My Servant Moses (1964)

[Resource Manager]

25 August 2014

 

"We must remember that it is by belief of the true gospel that men are saved, not by becoming members of a community. But that being said, we must also remember that a man in Christ has a living connection through Christ with others in the same position. Such must assemble together for the common objects of the faith: to preach the gospel, to edify one another, to collectively “guard the deposit” of truth. Over emphasis on either side of this matter can become subversive of truth." 

 

- John Carter

Faith (1959)