Jesus is described as “the faithful witness” (Revelation 1:5), which means He told the truth in everything He reported to mankind about God. He claimed He came from God, had direct knowledge of Him, and bore accurate testimony about Him.

I’m mighty glad that God’s love is steadfast. Were it not for His lovingkindness, this weak child of His would have been disinherited long, long ago. And, in Christ, I yearn for the sweet day when I shall be able to thank Him more properly.

If we reject “organized” religion, where does that leave the Lord’s Supper? Are we really “Christians” today if we don’t take seriously an observance that, in the New Testament, was so extremely important to Christians in the New Testament period?

Creating beings with a free will is exactly what God did when He created us. And the result is that those who accept Him, whether many or few, do so freely and lovingly — rather than under the compulsion of any “irresistible” programming by God.

It was surely God who chose whom He would save, but what He chose was a class of people defined by a criterion: the “obedience of faith” (Romans 1:5). This group is open to all who will obey. No one is barred by an eternal, unchangeable edict of God.

To say, as Calvinism does, that even as infants we are guilty of Adam’s sin — and are in a lost spiritual condition because of what Adam did — is to make a cruel joke out of Ezekiel’s statement, “The wickedness of the wicked shall be upon himself.”

When the vigor of our religious impulse is powered by truth about God, something happens that is very fine. We can soar high enough to begin tasting the freedom that Jesus spoke of: “You shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.”

If our reverence for God is real, we’ll show that reverence by yielding to His will, whether what happens next seems to be joyful or not. When faced with choices between good, better, and best, sincere seekers make these choices by deferring to God.

It is more blessed to give than to receive. Even with God, we should derive more joy from giving than from getting. And it should not merely be because that is the way to “get” more blessedness. God was not created for us; we were created for Him.

The gospel means little to so many because so few have passed through any dark night of the soul that would enable them to appreciate the light. Never having desperately desired deliverance, they have no depth of gratitude for forgiveness

Difficulty tests us. In times of ease, we think we know ourselves and we say what we believe in words that sound right to our own ears, but only after an ordeal of painful self-probing are we likely to discover what we actually believe about God.

We don’t have the spiritual vision to see any more than the smallest fraction of God’s power; so we see very little of what could be ours if we truly sought Him. For the benefit of our praying, the “eyes” of our understanding need to be enlightened.

To live in this world is to know the pain of struggle and sorrow. So we can take it for granted that every person we encounter is struggling. We may not know the particulars, but it’s a safe bet that every person we meet is hurting in some way.

There is no denying that, as we grow older, our faces come to be a mirror of the contents of our hearts. “When you speak of heaven, let your face light up. When you speak of hell — well, then your everyday face will do” (Charles Haddon Spurgeon).

The world remains the same generation after generation. There is a certain context common to all men and women, no matter when and where they have lived. We experience the same joys, we suffer the same sorrows, and we encounter the same challenges.

Whatever ease and pleasure may be ours here, that should only whet our appetites for the real joys to come. And whatever difficulty or pain we may have to deal with while “on the job,” that should only increase our capacity to enjoy “quittin’ time.”

In every situation, we must ask what is the best thing that can be done, and having done what we knew was best, we must learn to be gratified by the knowledge that we’ve done the honorable thing. Integrity should be a source of joy to us.

Is love’s pain to be avoided? I know not what choice others may make, but I shall continue to keep my heart open to love. Even at the bitter end of love’s sweetness, there is no grief great enough to keep me from the clear, pure joy of having loved.