“I am black, but lovely!”  “I am black, but lovely!” Song of Solomon 1:5 The believer pictures her state. It is a seeming paradox. The extremes of lowliness and greatness are combined. She presents two aspects: deformity and loveliness compose the portrait. “I am black, but lovely!” Blackness is frightful and repulsive. No eye can […]

THE BELIEVER’S RULE OF LIFE I left the pulpit one night and a fellow asked me, “Do you believe ‘the law’ to be a believer’s rule of life?” He seemed surprised when I told him I did not. His very next question was, “How do you know how to live?” I told him immediately that […]

“Conversion is not the smooth, easygoing process some men seem to think it otherwise man’s heart would never have been compared to fallow ground and God’s Word to a plough.” -John Bunyan Truth! A sacred regard to the authority of God ought to lead us to reject an error, however old, sanctioned by whatever authority, […]

“The entrance of your words gives light; it gives understanding unto the simple.” –Psalm 119:130 J.C.Philpot The word “simple” means literally something which is not folded or twisted together. But owing to the treacherous and desperately deceitful heart of man, all, without exception, in a state of nature are the reverse of this. All their […]

Law demands righteousness from men; Grace brings righteousness to men.  Law sentences a living man to death; Grace brings a dead man to life.  Law speaks of what men must do for God; Grace tells of what Christ has done for men.  Law gives a knowledge of sin; Grace puts away sin.  Law brings God […]

Come my friend, let us go to the throne of grace, and put up such petitions as may show that we have honourable views of the riches and bounty of our king. I am but a poor man in the trade of grace; I live from hand to mouth, and procure just enough, as we […]

Go and lay your icy heart upon   His flaming heart of love! (From Octavius Winslow’s, “Christ, the Everlasting Father”) The everlasting love of Christ never veers, never chills, and knows not the shadow of a change. Measuring Christ’s love to us by our love to Him, we often imagine that it must necessarily be […]

Unto you who believe — He is precious! (“Every Day!” Author unknown, 1872) “Unto you who believe — He is precious!” 1 Peter 2:7 It is to unbelievers only, that Christ is “as a root out of a dry ground” — having no form nor loveliness. To those who know Him, and put their trust […]

The Brazen Serpent  “As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness (Num. 21:4-9), even so must the Son of man be lifted up” (John 3:14). Preachers are like the pole to which Moses fastened the brazen serpent. Our only function, our only usefulness is to hold up Christ crucified before sinners. The Gospel we […]

It is the blood of Jesus, applied by the Spirit (Octavius Winslow) There is a perpetual proneness to seek our fruitfulness from anything but a close, spiritual, and constant dealing with the cross of Jesus. But as well might we expect the earth to clothe itself with verdure, or the tree to blossom, and the […]