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A vehicle for venting on philosophy, religion, and the general state of things. Proprietor: C. W. Powell

Saturday, April 12, 2014

Morning Prayer, April 11, 2014

Precious Lord Jesus, teach me Your Law, as you promised. When I learn from You, I
know that Your Law is the Truth, and cannot pass away. In learning from you, I
become much more concerned about my transgressions of Your law, rather than the
infractions of others, knowing that You must cleanse me from beams before I can
handle the motes.

You teach me that the law is much more significant when written in the heart than
when written on the hands. You write on both, dear Lord, but the works of the hands
become superficial if Your love is not written in our hearts.

How great and gifted was Your servant Moses, O precious Lord. He was sent to point
the world to the Lord Jesus, who would give us the Holy Spirit to direct our feet into
the paths of truth. Even so, do it in me, Dear Lord. In the Name of your dear Son, Jesus
Christ, we pray it of You, our Father in heaven. Amen.

Thursday, April 10, 2014

April 10, 2014. Morning Prayer and meditation on Proverbs 28:26

Dear Lord, teach me today to trust in You for all things and not to follow the vain
sparks ignited in my own heart, for that would be to play the fool.

I commit my way unto You today, and pray that you would establish my thoughts in
wisdom, righteousness, sanctification, and redemption for these are the things of God
that we behold in the face of Jesus Christ.

Remove the veil from my heart and teach my feet how to walk in your commandments,
for this is the first miracle done by your apostles after receiving the gift of the Holy
Ghost. How precious is that gift: to know how to walk before You in the land of the
living.

Teach me, O Precious Father, by Your grace to live soberly, righteously, and godly in
this present world. Through the blood of Your Son, our Savior, Jesus Christ, Amen.

Pr 28:26 He that trusteth in his own heart is a fool: but whoso walketh wisely, he shall
be delivered.

Wednesday, April 09, 2014

April 9, 2014: Morning Prayer and Meditation on Psalm 140:6-8

“6  I said unto the LORD, Thou art my God: hear the voice of my supplications, O LORD.
7  O GOD the Lord, the strength of my salvation, thou hast covered my head in the day of battle.
8  Grant not, O LORD, the desires of the wicked: further not his wicked device; lest they exalt themselves. Selah.” (Ps 140:6-8)
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Precious Father in Heaven, How precious are Your promises to me and to all Your
people.  I confess that You desire us to confess our faith in words that have meaning,
and we rejoice to “offer the calves of our lips.’  If we confess You before men, the
Lord Jesus will confess us before You and the Angels in Heaven.

But we always begin with You, O precious Father.  What we say before men, we must
first say to You.  We are “to take words  and turn to the LORD: say unto him, Take
away all iniquity, and receive us graciously….”
How precious it is, Father, to lay hold on Your promises and say unto You, “You are
my God: hear the voice of my supplications, O Lord.” 

You have  given us such precious promises that if we being evil know how to give
good gifts to our children how much more shall You, our Heavenly Father, give good
gifts to those who ask.  If we knock, You will open; if we seek, we will find; if we ask,
we shall receive.

For You are our God, we do confess.  You are God of the whole world that You
created, but You are special to Your Own, those predestined by You, the Father; those
redeemed by the  blood of Your Only Begotten Son, Jesus Christ; and those called into
new life and faith by the Holy Spirit.  We confess and glory in the truth that we are
Your own people, called out of darkness into the glorious light of Your dear Son.

You, O Father, are the strength of my salvation.  The strength of my salvation does not
lie in any part of my nature, O Precious Lord.  Not in my intellect, for that ladder does
not reach to heaven;  not in my will, for it is in bondage to sin like my mind;  not in my
emotions which are prone to hate both God and my neighbor.  The power must come
from You, O precious Father. 

You are my helmet of salvation and my only defense from Satan and all his hosts.  You
are my salvation and the strength of my soul.  Strengthen me, O precious Lord, with
might in the inner man, for I am weak and without strength if You are not with me. 
Your rod and Your staff strengthen me. 

But You strengthen my inner man, according to Your glorious power, unto all patience
and joyfulness so that I can give thanks unto You, who have  made me and all Your
people able to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light, for You have
delivered me from the power of darkness, and has translated me into the kingdom of
his dear Son, along with all Your people.  This was the result of no power in me, but
Your mighty Word and Spirit.

Hence, I can pray, O Father, that You will deprive the wicked of their desires; those
that boast against You and take Your Name in vain.  Their wicked devices will not
bear fruit, for You will not give Your glory to another, but abase the proud and war
against them.

For Yours is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever and ever.  Amen, in the
Name of Your dear Son, Whom we love and serve.

Tuesday, April 08, 2014

April 8, 2014: Morning Prayer and Meditation on Psalm 092:04-8

4  For thou, LORD, hast made me glad through thy work: I will triumph in the works
of thy hands.
5  O LORD, how great are thy works! and thy thoughts are very deep.
6  A brutish man knoweth not; neither doth a fool understand this.
7   When the wicked spring as the grass, and when all the workers of iniquity do
flourish; it is that they shall be destroyed for ever:
8  But thou, LORD, art most high for evermore.” (Ps 92:4-8)
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Our Precious Father in Heaven,  We know that men are like brutes, little better than
animals if they lack understanding in one important thing.  You are most high forever.  

Your works are very great, and your thoughts are very deep.  Fools do not understand
this, for they are locked into the folly of their own minds and are as the beasts of the
field that are slaughtered for food for others.

Because the godly have seen and understand that Your thoughts are very deep and your
works are very great, they are glad in their hearts, because they know that all of your
works are done in power and wisdom for the benefit of your people.

How great are your thoughts, precious Father!  You allow the wicked to spring up and
flourish as the grass because you have a purpose for them.  Because Your thoughts are
so deep, we cannot understand that purpose, but we know that when that good and
wise purpose is fulfilled they shall be destroyed forever and will no longer be
remembered.

We know that these things are good because through the everlasting covenant of
redemption you have purchased us from the kingdom of sin and darkness by the blood
of Jesus Christ, your Son.

Without the blood of Christ, we would be as  blind and brutish as any other and would
be able to see only the things of this world, seeking its pleasures, without God and
without hope.

We rejoice that you have taught us to live soberly, righteously, and godly in this
present world, and to seek our hope in the world to come.  Amen.

This is good, O precious Father, and we esteem it to be good, for you are most high for
evermore.  You have created all things and all things are yours.  We will rejoice and
glorify Your Name forever and ever.

O the depth of the riches both of Your wisdom and knowledge, O God! How
unsearchable are Your judgments, and Your ways past finding out! 

For who hath known Your mind, O Precious Father, or who hath been Your
counselor?  Who hath first given to You, and it shall be recompensed unto him again? 

For of You, and through You, and To You, are all things, and we will give You glory
for ever. Amen.

Monday, April 07, 2014

Not the precious Name, but the empty Name of Jesus.

Posted as a comment this morning to a friend's post.

Jack Burhenne I think the name of Jesus gives "love" a run for its money. From Francis Schaeffer's Escape from Reason -

"I have come to the point where, when I hear the word Jesus - which means so much to me because of the Person of the historic Jesus and His work - I listen carefully because I have with sorrow become more afraid of the word Jesus than almost any other word in the modern world. The word is used as a contentless banner, and our generation is invited to follow it. But there is no rational, scriptural content by which to test it, and thus the word is being used to teach the very opposite things from those which Jesus taught. Men are called to follow the word with highly motivated fervency, and nowhere more than in the new morality which follows the radical theology. It is now Jesus-like to sleep with a girl or man, if she or he needs you. As long as you are trying to be human, you are being Jesus-like to sleep with the other person - at the cost, be it noted, of breaking the specific morality which Jesus taught. But to these people this does not matter, because that is downstairs in the area of rational scriptural content.

We have come then to this fearsome place where the word Jesus has become the enemy of the Person Jesus, and the enemy of what Jesus taught. We must fear this contentless banner of the word Jesus not because we do not love Jesus, but because we do love Him. We must fight this contentless banner, with its deep motivations, rooted in the memories of the race, which is being used for the purpose of sociological form and control. We must teach our spiritual children to do the same.

This accelerating trend makes me wonder whether when Jesus said that toward the end-time there will be other Jesuses, He meant something like this. We must never forget that the great enemy who is coming is the Anti-Christ, he is not anti-non-Christ, He is anti-Christ. Increasingly over the last few years the word Jesus, separated from the content of the Scriptures, has become the enemy of the Jesus of history, the Jesus who died and rose and who is coming again and who is the eternal Son of God. So let us take care. If evangelical Christians begin to slip into a dichotomy, to separate an encounter with Jesus from the content of the Spriptures (including the discussable and the verifiable portions of Scripture), we shall without intending to, be throwing ourselves and the next generation into the millstream of the modern system. This system surrounds us as an almost monolithic consensus."

Sunday, April 06, 2014

April 7, 2014: Morning Prayer and Meditation on Psalm 34:1-3


1 I will bless the LORD at all times: his praise shall continually be in my mouth.
2 My soul shall make her boast in the LORD: the humble shall hear thereof, and be glad.
3 O magnify the LORD with me, and let us exalt his name together.

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Precious Heavenly Father, I make my vow before You to bless You at all times. There is no better fit
instrument for the praises of God than the mouth of Your saints.

I beseech You, therefore, dear Lord, that You purify my heart by faith from all idolatry and wickedness,
for out of the abundance of the heart the mouth speaks. If my heart is not tuned to Your praise, then what
I speak with the mouth is hypocrisy and deceit that is abominable to You.

Therefore, I pray that my soul will be purified from the pride and arrogance of idolatry so that I may
make my boast in the Lord alone. Those who have also been humbled by You will recognize Your work
in me and will be glad and we will have fellowship with each other.

Isa 28:3 The crown of pride, the drunkards of Ephraim, shall be trodden under feet. You resist the
proud but give grace to the humble.

I will magnify the Lord. What! How shall I make You larger than You are, O Precious Father? What
shall I add to Your glory and Your power and Your greatness and Your strength and wisdom?

I can add nothing to them, but I can add them to my understanding of You, and teach other men so. That I
will do as long as I have breath. Work in my soul that this praise be not empty and vain.

O Father, may the dear people of God join with me in magnifying the Lord all the days that we live.
May we join hands and hearts and voices in the church of Jesus Christ which is the pillar and ground
of the truth, so that the glory and majesty of God will resound throughout the world, for God is worthy
 alone to be praised by the mouths and hearts of men.

Amen and Amen, in the Name of our Savior, Jesus of Nazareth, enthroned in the Heavens.

April 6: Morning Prayer and Meditation on Psalm 122

1 I was glad when they said unto me, Let us go into the house of the LORD.
2 Our feet shall stand within thy gates, O Jerusalem.
3 Jerusalem is builded as a city that is compact together:
4 Whither the tribes go up, the tribes of the LORD, unto the testimony of Israel, to give thanks unto the
name of the LORD. --Psalm 122.

Precious Father in Heaven, how much richer is our joy in your house than David knew, for his house
was the house of Moses, while ours is the house of the Lord Jesus Christ, the church that He has built
of living stone.

Shortly we will be going to the House of the Lord, which Paul said is the church, the pillar and ground
of the truth, the New Jerusalem which is above, the mother of us all. We joy in your church and will
not forsake her assembly.

We will stand within your government and covenant, the gates of your kingdom. Your covenant is
certain and sure and the church is one, compact together, through the preaching of the gospel and the
ministry that you have ordained from heaven: “From whom the whole body fitly joined together and
compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of
every part, maketh increase of the body unto the edifying of itself in love.” So wrote the Apostle Paul
of the church.

There in your church is the pillar and ground of the truth, the holy scriptures, the testimony that you
have given to your church, the testimony that can never fail. And we will give thanks unto the name of
the LORD for it is great. Amen and Amen. In Jesus Name.

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