Milo

May 15th

The habit of rising to the occasion

That ye may know what is the hope of His calling … Eph. 1:18.

Remember what you are saved for—that the Son of God might be manifested in your mortal flesh. Bend the whole energy of your powers to realize your election as a child of God; rise to the occasion every time.
You cannot do anything for your salvation, but you must do something to manifest it, you must work out what God has worked in. Are you working it out with your tongue, and your brain and your nerves? If you are still the same miserable crosspatch, set on your own way, then it is a lie to say that God has saved and sanctified you.
God is the Master Engineer, He allows the difficulties to come in order to see if you can vault over them properly—“By my God have I leaped over a wall.” God will never shield you from any of the requirements of a son or daughter of His. Peter says—“Think it not strange concerning the fiery trial which is to try you.” Rise to the occasion; do the thing. It does not matter how it hurts as long as it gives God the chance to manifest Himself in your mortal flesh.
May God not find the whine in us any more, but may He find us full of spiritual pluck and athleticism, ready to face anything He brings. We have to exercise ourselves in order that the Son of God may be manifested in our mortal flesh. God never has museums. The only aim of the life is that the Son of God may be manifested, and all dictation to God vanishes. Our Lord never dictated to His Father, and we are not here to dictate to God; we are here to submit to His will so that He may work through us what He wants. When we realize this, He will make us broken bread and poured-out wine to feed and nourish others.

May 15

“Men see not the bright light which is in the clouds.”
(Job 37:21)

THE world owes much of its beauty to cloudland. The unchanging blue of the Italian sky hardly compensates for the changefulness and glory of the clouds. Earth would become a wilderness apart from their ministry. There are clouds in human, life, shadowing, refreshing, and sometimes draping it in blackness of night; but there is never a cloud without its bright light. “I do set my bow in the cloud!”

If we could see the clouds from the other side where they lie in billowy glory, bathed in the light they intercept, like heaped ranges of Alps, we should be amazed at their splendid magnificence.

We look at their under side; but who shall describe the bright light that bathes their summits and searches their valleys and is reflected from every pinnacle of their expanse? Is not every drop drinking in health-giving qualities, which it will carry to the earth?

O child of God! If you could see your sorrows and troubles from the other side; if instead of looking up at them from earth, you would look down on them from the heavenly places where you sit with Christ; if you knew how they are reflecting in prismatic beauty before the gaze of Heaven, the bright light of Christ’s face, you would be content that they should cast their deep shadows over the mountain slopes of existence. Only remember that clouds are always moving and passing before God’s cleansing wind.” Selected.

“I cannot know why suddenly the storm
Should rage so fiercely round me in its wrath;
But this I know—God watches all my path,
  And I can trust.

“I may not draw aside the mystic veil
That hides the unknown future from my sight,
Nor know if for me waits the dark or light;
  But I can trust.

“I have no power to look across the tide,
To see while here the land beyond the river;
But this I know—shall be God’s forever;
  So I can trust.”

15 MAY (PREACHED 1770)

The grand topics of heaven

‘And, behold, there talked with him two men, which were Moses and Elijah: who appeared in glory, and spake of his decease which he should accomplish at Jerusalem.’ Luke 9:30, 31
SUGGESTED FURTHER READING: Luke 9:28–36

If we had only heard that Moses and Elijah came down to converse with Jesus, we should have felt some desire or wish to know the subject of their conference. Here we are told, and it is worthy our notice. They spake not of such trifling incidents as the world accounts great, not of the rise and fall of kingdoms. Their conversation turned entirely upon him, his sufferings and the glorious event of his undertaking. These are the grand topics of heaven and heaven-born souls. Alas for poor mortals, to many of whom the Redeemer’s sufferings and glories, which is the delightful theme and song of angels, is tasteless, tedious and offensive. They spake of his decease or his departure—his Exodus—it is the word by which we call the book that relates the departure of Israel from Egypt and may be understood of:
(i) his departure out of life, in agonies and sufferings. This was foretold by Moses and the prophets; this was now confirmed by Moses and Elijah. It was an interesting subject to them. They were redeemed by that price which he was soon to pay. They saw more clearly the dignity of his person and the value of his redemption than we can do in this imprisoned state. We may believe they did not speak of it in that cold and careless manner which we often do.
(ii) his departure out of the world. When having completed his purpose, he would return victorious to heaven. As he had his sufferings in view, so likewise his glory.

FOR MEDITATION: Let us learn to imitate the glorified saints and talk more of Jesus, what he has done and what he is doing where he is. Let us aspire to be with them that we may know more and praise better. We are too much tied to the things of sense, too willing and well satisfied to live at a distance from our home. Our willingness to wait the Lord’s time for our dismission should be an act of submission and resignation to his will—and not because we are pleased with the world. Salvation—a good hope that you shall join the heavenly host.

SERMON SERIES: ON THE TRANSFIGURATION, NO. 5 [3/3], LUKE 9:30–31

May 14th

The habit of enjoying the disagreeable

That the life also of Jesus might be made manifest in our mortal flesh. 2 Cor. 4:10.

We have to form habits to express what God’s grace has done in us. It is not a question of being saved from hell, but of being saved in order to manifest the life of the Son of God in our mortal flesh, and it is the disagreeable things which make us exhibit whether or not we are manifesting His life. Do I manifest the essential sweetness of the Son of God, or the essential irritation of ‘myself’ apart from Him? The only thing that will enable me to enjoy the disagreeable is the keen enthusiasm of letting the life of the Son of God manifest itself in me. No matter how disagreeable a thing may be, say—“Lord, I am delighted to obey Thee in this matter,” and instantly the Son of God will press to the front, and there will be manifested in my human life that which glorifies Jesus.
There must be no debate. The moment you obey the light, the Son of God presses through you in that particular; but if you debate you grieve the Spirit of God. You must keep yourself fit to let the life of the Son of God be manifested, and you cannot keep yourself fit if you give way to self-pity. Our circumstances are the means of manifesting how wonderfully perfect and extraordinarily pure the Son of God is. The thing that ought to make the heart beat is a new way of manifesting the Son of God. It is one thing to choose the disagreeable, and another thing to go into the disagreeable by God’s engineering. If God puts you there, He is amply sufficient.
Keep your soul fit to manifest the life of the Son of God. Never live on memories; let the word of God be always living and active in you.

May 14

“In the selfsame day, as God had said unto him.”
(Gen. 17:23)

INSTANT obedience is the only kind of obedience there is; delayed obedience is disobedience. Every time God call us to any duty, He is offering to make a covenant with us; doing the duty is our part, and He will do His part in special blessing.
The only way we can obey is to obey “in the selfsame day,” as Abraham did. To be sure, we often postpone a duty and then later on do it as fully as we can. It is better to do this than not to do it at all. But it Is then, at the best, only a crippled, disfigured, half-way sort of duty-doing; and a postponed duty never can bring the full blessing that God intended, and that it would have brought if done at the earliest possible moment.
It is a pity to rob ourselves, along with robbing God and others, by procrastination. “In the selfsame day” is the Genesis way of saying, “Do it now.”—Messages for the Morning Watch.
Luther says that “a true believer will crucify the question, ‘Why?’ He will obey without questioning.” I will not be one of those who, except they see signs and wonders, will in no wise believe. I will obey without questioning.

  “Ours not to make reply,
     Ours not to reason why,
  Ours but to do and die.”

Obedience is the fruit of faith; patience, the bloom on the fruit.—Christina Rossetti.