He may effect us directly by His Spirit, with the force of a thunderbolt, or He may choose to woo read more

He may effect us directly by His Spirit, with the force of a thunderbolt, or He may choose to woo us gently by stirring up our conscience. But, in addition, God affects us by determining that in the universe certain causes shall bring about certain effects. Cause and effect is, therefore, the operation of God through normal channels rather than through special channels. We have our normal way of acting when we drive a car. We can more or less put it in "automatic pilot" while we carry on a conversation, but when an emergency arises, we take conscious personal control. I have a hunch that God has something for which this automatic pilot will serve as an illustration. That is, His routine way of operating is cause and effect, and He is in control of it, so that when cause and effect affects us, then God is affecting us. That is what the Apostle Paul means in Galatians when he says, "Do not kid yourself -- God is not blind. What you do, you will get paid for." The causes which we have set in operation by our own personal choices will inevitably bring about certain results. But God is involved because God makes cause and effect to work. [Continued tomorrow].

Jeremiah refutes the popular, modern notion that the end of religion is an integrated personality, freed of its fears, its read more

Jeremiah refutes the popular, modern notion that the end of religion is an integrated personality, freed of its fears, its doubts, and its frustrations. Certainly Jeremiah was no integrated personality. It is doubtful if... he ever knew the meaning of the word "peace". We have no evidence that his internal struggle was ever ended, although the passing years no doubt brought an increasing acceptance of destiny. Jeremiah, if his "confessions" are any index, needed a course in pastoral psychiatry in the very worst way... The feeling cannot be escaped that if Jeremiah had been integrated, it would have been at the cost of ceasing to be Jeremiah! A man at peace simply could not be a Jeremiah. Spiritual health is good; mental assurance is good; but the summons of faith is neither to an integrated personality nor to the laying-by of all questions, but to the dedication of personality -- with all its fears and questions -- to its duty and destiny under God.

Take up the cross if thou the crown would'st gain.
[Lat., Tolle crucem, qui vis auferre coronam.]

Take up the cross if thou the crown would'st gain.
[Lat., Tolle crucem, qui vis auferre coronam.]

Here he tells us that the new birth is first of all "not of blood". You don't get it through read more

Here he tells us that the new birth is first of all "not of blood". You don't get it through the blood stream, through heredity. Your parents can give you much, but they cannot give you this. Being born in a Christian home does not make you a Christian.

If I crave hungrily to be used to show the way of liberty to a soul in bondage, instead of read more

If I crave hungrily to be used to show the way of liberty to a soul in bondage, instead of caring only that it be delivered; if I nurse my disappointment when I fail, instead of asking that another the word of release may be given, then I know nothing of Calvary love.

We are building may splendid churches in this country, but we are not providing leaders to run them. I would read more

We are building may splendid churches in this country, but we are not providing leaders to run them. I would rather have a wooden church with a splendid parson, than a splendid church with a wooden parson.

The perfection of His relation to us swallows up all our imperfections, all our defeats, all our evils; for our read more

The perfection of His relation to us swallows up all our imperfections, all our defeats, all our evils; for our childhood is born of His fatherhood. That man is perfect in faith who can come to God in the utter dearth of his feelings and his desires, without a glow or an aspiration, with the weight of low thoughts, failures, neglects, and wandering forgetfulness, and say to Him, "Thou art my refuge, because Thou art my home". Such a faith will not lead to presumption. The man who can pray such a prayer will know better than another that God is not mocked; that He is not a man that He should repent; that tears and entreaties will not work on Him to the breach of one of His laws; that for God to give a man, because he asked for it, that which was not in harmony with His laws of truth and right, would be to damn him -- to cast him into the outer darkness.

Christianity is a source; no one supply of water and refreshment that comes from it can be called the sum read more

Christianity is a source; no one supply of water and refreshment that comes from it can be called the sum of Christianity. It is a mistake, and may lead to much error, to exhibit any series of maxims, even those of the Sermon on the Mount, as the ultimate sum and formula into which Christianity may be run up.

Forgive many things in others; nothing in yourself.

Forgive many things in others; nothing in yourself.