[Ohio-Communities-of-Faith] FW: [CWWC] TBV TPMMP June 22

Tue Jun 22 21:43:24 UTC 2021

From: committed-walk-with-Christ at groups.io [mailto:committed-walk-with-Christ at groups.io] On Behalf Of Penny Golden via groups.io
Sent: Tuesday, June 22, 2021 5:08 PM
To: committed-walk-with-Christ at groups.io
Subject: EXT: [CWWC] TBV TPMMP June 22

June 22

Thru Baca's Vale

"He led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye." Deuteronomy 32:10

"He led them about." This was true literally. What a circuitous, tangled, backward and forward route was that of the children of Israel in the wilderness! Yet every step was under God's direction; they never moved till the cloudy pillar led the way. But how does the Lord lead about in grace? By leading his Israel into a path of which they do not see the end. One turn of the road hides the next.

I have read that you may make a road with a curve at every quarter of a mile, and yet in a hundred miles the distance will not be so much as a mile more than a perfectly straight line. So in grace. The length of the road swallows up the turnings. But these turnings make the road seem more round about than it really is. All before us is hidden. For instance, when the Lord begins a work of grace, he brings convictions of sin, opens up the spirituality of the law, makes the soul feel guilty, guilty, guilty in every thought, word, and deed. But does a man in that condition know what the Lord is about? Can he clearly trace out the work of God upon his soul? Is he able to say, "This, this is the work of God upon my heart?"

For the most part, he knows not what is the matter with him; why he is so distressed; why he can take no rest; why the things of eternity keep rolling in upon his soul; why he stands in continual dread of the wrath to come; why his mind is so exercised with thoughts upon God; why he feels condemnation, bondage, and misery. Nor even when the Lord is pleased to raise him up to some hope, to apply some sweet promise to his soul, to encourage him in various ways under the ministry of the word, can he often take the full comfort of it. He may for a time, but it is soon gone, and he can scarcely believe it to be real.

Unbelief suggests that it did not come exactly in the right way, or did not last long enough, or did not go deep enough, or was not just such as he has heard others speak of; and so he is filled with doubts, fears, and anxieties whether it was really from the Lord. But when God leads him on a step further; opens up the gospel, reveals Christ, drops into his heart some sweet testimony, gives him some blessed discovery of his interest in the Lord Jesus, and seals it with a divine witness in his heart, this banishes all his doubts and fears, and fills his soul with joy and peace. Yet even after this, when the sweet feeling is gone, he may sink again very low, and may question the reality of the revelation he has enjoyed. All this is "leading about;" for one turn of the road hides the other. 

J.C. Philpot (1802 – 1869) 

The Poor Man's Morning Portion
"And they came unto the brook of Eshcol, and cut down from thence a branch with a cluster of grapes." Numbers 13:23  

Was not this single cluster of God's earnest to the people of the sure possession of the land where those delicious fruits grew? And was not the size and weight of this one branch a sample how full and extensive all the blessings, both of the covenant and of the promised land, should be to the after possession of God's people? My soul, dost thou not see in it then a precious representation of Jesus, that one branch, and of all that cluster of blessings which are in him? Well might the church cry out concerning the Redeemer, "My beloved is unto me as a cluster of camphire in the vineyards of Engedi." For whether this camphire, this copher, denotes the vine of Cyprus, or the fruit of the palm-tree, in either, or in both, the soul-strengthening, soul-exhilarating, soul-healing virtues of this unnumbered excellencies, may well be set forth under the beautiful similitude, of the cluster of grapes from the brook of Eshcol.  

Yes, thou dear Lord! Thou hast condescended to compare thyself to the vine; and to thy people thou art indeed a cluster of all that is lovely, sweet, gracious, and endearing. In thee dwelleth, like the berries of the richest cluster, all the fulness of the Godhead bodily. In thee is found all the purity, holiness, harmlessness, and perfection of the human nature, as God manifest in the flesh. In thee, as God-man Mediator, we behold the cluster of all spiritual graces, all spiritual, temporal, eternal blessings, all divine promises, all, all are in thee, to give out to thy people. Neither is there a mercy thy people can want, of grace here, or glory hereafter, but what is treasured up in thee, in a fulness perfectly inexhaustible. Precious Jesus, revive my spirits this day with this view of thee. Give me to see when my soul desireth the first ripe fruit, that thou thyself art all my soul can need.   

Bring me to the brook of Eshcol, and there let my eyes, my heart, my whole soul, and body, and spirit, feast itself in the contemplation and enjoyment of thy person, thy graces, gifts, and fulness, until, under the full satisfaction my soul findeth, in being eternally filled with thy goodness, I cry out with the church, my beloved is unto me as the richest of all the clusters of copher in the vineyards of Engedi. 

Robert Hawker (1753-1827)

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