From Charles Spurgeon’s “Faith’s Checkbook”
Trust and Do; Do and Trust
December 11
Trust in the Lord, and do good; so shalt thou dwell in the land, and verily thou shalt be fed. (Psalm 37:3)
Trust and do are words which go well together, in the order in which the Holy Spirit has placed them. We should have faith, and that faith should work. Trust in God sets us upon holy doing: we trust God for good, and then we do good. We do not sit still because we trust, but we arouse ourselves and expect the Lord to work through us and by us. It is not ours to worry and do evil but to trust and do good. We neither trust without doing nor do without trusting.
Adversaries would root us out if they could; but by trusting and doing we dwell in the land. We will not go into Egypt, but we will remain in Immanuel’s land-the providence of God, the Canaan of covenant love. We are not so easily to be got rid of as the Lord’s enemies suppose. They cannot thrust us Out nor stamp us out: where God has given us a name and a place, there we abide.
But what about the supply of our necessities? The Lord has put a “verily” into this promise. As sure as God is true, His people shall be fed. It is theirs to trust and to do, and it is the Lord’s to do according to their trust. If not fed by ravens, or fed by an Obadiah, or fed by a widow, yet they shall be fed somehow. Away, ye fears!
From the Faith’s Checkbook Mobile Devotional Android app – http://www.LookingUpwardApps.com/fcb
Like this:
Like Loading...
Tags: abide, actions, adversaries, almighty, arouse, attitude, away, believers, Caanan, Christ, Christians, Comforter, covenant love, do, doing, dwell, easily, Egypt, Elohim, enemies, evil, expect, Faith, fears, fed, feed, given, go, God, God's people, God's Son, good, Heavenly Father, holiness, holy, Holy Spirit, Immanuel, Immanuel's land, Jehovah, Jesus, land, Lord, Lord's enemies, name, necessities, neither, Obadiah, order, ourselves, out, place, placed, Promise, protection, protector, providence of God, Provider, provision, ravens, remain, rid of, root, Savior, sets, sit, stamp, still, supply, suppose, through, thrust, together, true, trust, upon, well, widow, words, work, worry, Yahweh, Yeshua
From Charles Spurgeon’s “Faith’s Checkbook”
Doing what God Can Bless
November 28
The Lord shall command the blessing upon thee in thy storehouses, and in all that thou settest thine hand unto. (Deuteronomy 28:8)
If we obey the Lord our God He will bless that which He gives us. Riches are no curse when blessed of the Lord. When men have more than they require for their immediate need and begin to lay up in storehouses, the dry rot of covetousness or the blight of hard-heartedness is apt to follow the accumulation; but with God’s blessing it is not so. Prudence arranges the saving, liberality directs the spending, gratitude maintains consecration, and praise sweetens enjoyment. It is a great mercy to have God’s blessing in one’s iron safe and on one’s banking account.
What a favor is made ours by the last clause! “The Lord shall bless thee in all that thou settest thine hand unto.” We would not put our hand to anything upon which we dare not ask God’s blessing, neither would we go about it without prayer and faith. But what a privilege to be able to look for the Lord’s help in every enterprise! Some talk of a lucky man: the blessing of the Lord is better than luck. The patronage of the great is nothing to the favor of God. Self-reliance is all very well; but the Lord’s blessing is infinitely more than all the fruit of talent, genius, or tact.
From the Faith’s Checkbook Mobile Devotional Android app – http://www.LookingUpwardApps.com/fcb
Like this:
Like Loading...
Tags: accumulation, almighty, arranges, ask, banking account, begin, Bless, blessed, blessing, blight, Christ, clause, Comforter, command, consecration, covetousness, curse, directs, do, dry rot, Elohim, employment, enterprise, Faith, favor, ffollow, fruit, genius, gives, God, God's blessing, God's Son, gratitude, great, hands, hard-heartedness, have, Heavenly Father, Holy Spirit, immediate, iron safe, Jehovah, Jesus, lay, liberality, look, Lord, Lord's help, lucky, maintains, mercy, more, need, obedience, obey, patronage, praise, Pray, prayer, privilege, Promise, Provider, provision, prudence, require, riches, saving, Savior, self-reliance, set, spending, storehouses, sweetens, tact, talent, work, Yahweh, Yeshua
From Charles Spurgeon’s “Faith’s Checkbook”
Walk Without Stumbling
November 10
He will not suffer thy foot to be moved. (Psalm 121:3)
If the Lord will not suffer it, neither men nor devils can do it. How greatly would they rejoice if they could give us a disgraceful fall, drive us from our position, and bury us out of memory! They could do this to their heart’s content were it not for one hindrance, and only one: the Lord will not suffer it; and if He does not suffer it, we shall not suffer it.
The way of life is like traveling among the Alps. Along the mountain path one is constantly exposed to the slipping of the foot. Where the way is high the head is apt to swim, and then the feet soon slide; there are spots which are smooth as glass and others that are rough with loose stones, and in either of these a fall is hard to avoid. He who throughout life is enabled to keep himself upright and to walk without stumbling has the best of reasons for gratitude. What with pitfalls and snares, weak knees, weary feet, and subtle enemies, no child of God would stand fast for an hour were it not for the faithful love which will not suffer his foot to be moved.
Amidst a thousand snares I stand
Upheld and guarded by thy hand;
That hand unseen shall hold me still,
And lead me to thy holy hill.
From the Faith’s Checkbook Mobile Devotional Android app – http://www.LookingUpwardApps.com/fcb
Like this:
Like Loading...
Tags: almighty, Alps, among, attacks, avoid, battles, believers, best, bury, Child of God, Christ, constantly, content, could, demons, devils, disgraceful, do, drive, Elohim, enabled, enemies, exposed, faithful, fall, fast, feet, foot, give, glass, God, God's people, God's Son, gratitude, greatly, guarded, hand, hard, head, hearts, Heavenly Father, help, high, hill, himself, hindrance, hold, holy, Holy Spirit, hope, hour, Jehovah, Jesus, keep, knees, lead, Life, loose, Lord, love, memory, men, mountain, moved, out, path, pitfalls, position, Promise, protection, protector, reasons, rejoice, rough, safety, Satan, Savior, slide, slipping, smooth, snares, spots, stand, still, stones, struggles, stumbling, subtle, suffer, swim, temptations, thousand, throughout, traveling, trials, tribulations, unseen, upheld, upright, walk, way, way of life, weak, weary, without, would, Yahweh, Yeshua
From Charles Spurgeon’s “Faith’s Checkbook”
The Magnitude of Grace
November 8
My grace is sufficient for thee; for my strength is made perfect in weakness. (2 Corinthians 12:9)
Our weakness should be prized as making room for divine strength. We might never have known the power of grace if we had not felt the weakness of nature. Blessed be the Lord for the thorn in the flesh, and the messenger of Satan, when they drive us to the strength of God.
This is a precious word from our Lord’s own lip. It has made the writer laugh for joy. God’s grace enough for me! I should think it is. Is not the sky enough for the bird and the ocean enough for the fish? The All-Sufficient is sufficient for my largest want. He who is sufficient for earth and heaven is certainly able to meet the case of one poor worm like me.
Let us, then, fall back upon our God and His grace. If He does not remove our grief, He will enable us to bear it. His strength shall be poured into us till the worm shall thresh the mountains, and a nothing shall be victor over all the high and mighty ones. It is better for us to have God’s strength than our own; for if we were a thousand times as strong as we are, it would amount to nothing in the face of the enemy; and if we could be weaker than we are, which is scarcely possible, yet we could do all things through Christ.
From the Faith’s Checkbook Mobile Devotional Android app – http://www.LookingUpwardApps.com/fcb
Like this:
Like Loading...
Tags: all, All-Sufficient, almighty, amount, attacks, back, battles, bear, believers, better, Bible, bird, blessed, blessing, case, Christ, Comforter, could, divine, do, drive, Earth, Elohim, enable, enemy, enough, face, fall, fish, flesh, God, God's Son, God's Word, grace, grief, Heaven, Heavenly Father, high, Holy Spirit, illness, Jehovah, Jesus, joy, largest, laugh, lips, Lord, meet, messenger, mighty, mountains, nature, nothing, ocean, perfect, poor, possible, poured, power, Precious, prized, Promise, Provider, remove, room, Satan, Savior, scarsely, sky, strength, strong, struggles, sufficient, things, thorn, thousaand, thresh, through, Times, upon, victor, want, weaker, weakness, Word, worm, worms, writer, Yahweh, Yeshua
From Charles Spurgeon’s “Faith’s Checkbook”
Delight and Desires
November 6
Delight thyself also in the Lord; and he shall give thee the desires of thine heart. (Psalm 37:4)
Delight in God has a transforming power and lifts a man above the gross desire of our fallen nature. Delight in Jehovah is not only sweet in itself, but it sweetens the whole soul, till the longings of the heart become such that the Lord can safely promise to fulfill them. Is not that a grand delight which molds our desires till they are like the desires of God?
Our foolish way is to desire and then set to work to compass what we desire. We do not go to work in God’s way, which is to seek Him first and then expect all things to be added unto us. If we will let our heart be filled with God till it runs over with delight, then the Lord Himself will take care that we shall not want any good thing. Instead of going abroad for joys let us stay at home with God and drink waters out of our own fountain. He can do for us far more than all our friends. It is better to be content with God alone than to go about fretting and pining for the paltry trifles of time and sense. For a while we may have disappointments; but if these bring us nearer to the Lord, they are things to be prized exceedingly, for they will in the end secure to us the fulfillment of all our right desires.
From the Faith’s Checkbook Mobile Devotional Android app – http://www.LookingUpwardApps.com/fcb
Like this:
Like Loading...
Tags: above, abroad, added, alike, all, almighty, alone, any, Award, believers, better, bring, care, Christ, Christian, closer, Comforter, compass, content, contentment, delight, desires, desiresmfallen, direction, disappointments, do, drink, Elohim, end, example, exceedingly, expect, first, foolish, formsmremakes, fountain, fretting, friends, fulfill, fulfillment, give, given, God, God's people, God's Son, going, good thing, grand, gross, guidance, heart, Heavenly Father, Holy Spirit, home, iniquity, Jehovah, Jesus, joys, lack, longings, Lord, molds, more, multiplied, nature, nearer, over, overflowing, own, paltry, pining, powermlifts, prized, Promise, Provider, reward, right desires, runs, safely, Savior, secure, seek, sense, set, similar, sin, soul, stay, sweetmsweetens, take, things, thyself, time, transforming, trifles, want, waters, way, whole, without, works, worldly, worrying, Yahweh, Yeshua
From Charles Spurgeon’s “Faith’s Checkbook”
Perfection and Preservation
November 1
Faithful is he that calleth you, who also will do it. (1 Thessalonians 5:24)
What will He do? He will sanctify us wholly. See the previous verse. He will carry on the work of purification till we are perfect in every part. He will preserve our “whole spirit, and soul, and body, blameless unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ.” He will not allow us to fall from grace, nor come under the dominion of sin. What great favors are these! Well may we adore the giver of such unspeakable gifts.
Who will do this? The Lord who has called us out of darkness into His marvelous light, out of death in sin into eternal life in Christ Jesus. Only He can do this: such perfection and preservation can only come from the God of all grace.
Why will He do it? Because He is “faithful”–faithful to His own promise which is pledged to save the believer; faithful to His Son, whose reward it is that His people shall he presented to Him faultless, faithful to the work which He has commenced in us by our effectual calling. It is not their own faithfulness but the Lord’s own faithfulness on which the saints rely.
Come, my soul, here is a grand feast to begin a dull month with. There may be fogs without, but there should be sunshine within.
From the Faith’s Checkbook Mobile Devotional Android app – http://www.LookingUpwardApps.com/fcb
Like this:
Like Loading...
Tags: adore, allow, almighty, believers, blameless, blessings, body, called, calleth, calling, Christ, Comforter, coming, commenced, darkness, Death, do, dominion, dull, effectual, Elohim, eternal life, faithful, faithfulness, fall, faultless, favors, feast, fogs, gifts, giver, God, God's Son, grace, grand, Heavenly Father, Holy Spirit, Jehovah, Jesus, light, Lord, marvelous, mouth, oreservation, out, part, people, perfect, perfection, pledged, preserve, Promise, purification, rewards, saints, salvation, sanctify, save, Savior, Second Coming, sin, soul, Spirit, sunshine, unspeakable, whole, wholly, within, without, work, Yahweh, Yeshua
From Charles Spurgeon’s “Faith’s Checkbook”
To Others an “Example”
March 16
Those things, which ye have both Warned, and received, and heard, and seen in me, do; and the God of peace shall be with you. (Philippians 4:9)
It is well when a man can with advantage be so minutely copied as Paul might have been. Oh, for grace to imitate him this day and every day!
Should we, through divine grace, carry into practice the Pauline teaching, we may claim the promise which is now open before us; and what a promise it is! God, who loves peace, makes peace, and breathes peace, will be with us. “Peace be with you” is a sweet benediction; but for the God of peace to be with us is far more. Thus we have the fountain as well as the streams, the sun as well as his beams. If the God of peace be with us, we shall enjoy the peace of God which passeth all understanding, even though outward circumstances should threaten to disturb. If men quarrel, we shall be sure to be peacemakers, if the Maker of peace be with us.
It is in the way of truth that real peace is found. If we quit the faith or leave the path of righteousness under the notion of promoting peace, we shall be greatly mistaken. First pure, then peaceable, is the order of wisdom and of fact. Let us keep to Paul’s line, and we shall have the God of peace with us as He was with the apostle.
From the Faith’s Checkbook Mobile Devotional Android app – http://www.LookingUpwardApps.com/fcb
Like this:
Like Loading...
Tags: abiding, action, advantage, Christ, copy, do, example, God, God of peace, grace, heard, Heavenly Father, Holy Spirit, imitate, Jehovah, Jesus, Lord, Paul, peace, peace that passeth all understanding, Promise, received, teachings, understanding, warned, witness
forhisgloryandpraise 