Good Friday Devotional "Deep Depression of Spirit is the Most Grievous of all Trials..." '

'My heart is like wax: it is melted within My breast…'                       

Psalm 22:14

Therefore He had to be made like His brothers and sisters in every respect, so that He could become a merciful and faithful high priest in things relating to God, to make atonement for the sins of the people.

Hebrews 2:17

Lord, I know You to be great with compassion,

So I come with a humble heart that’s broken.

Be gracious, forgive, and cleanse me from my sin,

To the praise of Your glorious grace.

I am crushed like a reed, but You’ll not break me;

My soul’s a flickering candle, but You’ll not quench me.

You bind up the brokenhearted and bring healing,

To the praise of Your glorious grace.

Bruised and downtrodden, my heart’s in pieces;

Wrap Your loving arms tightly ‘round me.

Bind and tie my wounded soul for Your glory,

To the praise of Your glorious grace.

I know You to be rich in mercy and grace,

Making my heart joyfully sing of Your praise,

Renew and revive my soul for Your great name’s sake

To the praise of Your glorious grace.

Praise to Your Glorious Grace

C.A. TAYLOR

Our Blessed Lord experienced a terrible sinking and melting of soul.  'The spirit of a man will sustain his infirmity, but a wounded spirit who can bear?'  Deep depression of spirit is the most grievous of all trials; all besides is as nothing.  Well might the suffering Savior cry to His God, 'Be not far from Me', for above all other seasons a man needs his God when his heart is melted within him because of heaviness.  Believer, come near the cross today, and humbly adore the King of glory as having once been brought far lower, in mental distress and inward anguish, than any one among us; and mark His fitness to become a faithful High Priest, who can be touched with a feeling of our infirmities.  Especially let those of us whose sadness springs directly from the withdrawal of a present sense of our Father's love, enter into near and intimate communion with Jesus.  Let us not give way to despair, since through this dark room the Master has passed before us. 

Our souls may sometimes long and faint, and thirst even to anguish, to behold the light of the Lord's countenance: at such times let us stay ourselves with the sweet fact of the sympathy of our great High Priest.  Our drops of sorrow may well be forgotten in the ocean of His griefs; but how high ought our love to rise!  Come in, O strong and deep love of Jesus, like the sea at the flood in spring tides, cover all my powers, drown all my sins, wash out all my cares, lift up my earth-bound soul, and float it right up to my Lord's feet, and there let me lie, a poor broken shell, washed up by His love, having no virtue or value; and only venturing to whisper to Him that if He will put His ear to me, He will hear within my heart faint echoes of the vast waves of His own love which have brought me where it is my delight to lie, even at His feet forever.

C. H. SPURGEON

 Mornings and Evenings

God has arranged it that in every conceivable way Jesus has been made like unto His brethren.  There are only two matters in which He is not like them ~His virgin birth and His sinless life. But in everything else, He has been identified with them in their infirmities.  There are no sufferings that His brethren suffer but that He has suffered them too.  There are no tears that His brethren shed, but that He has shed them too. God has made the Captain of our salvation perfect through suffering.  He would not be an adequate High Priest for us had He not been through everything that we go through. In our hour of suffering He says, "Come to Me, all you who labor and are heavy laden.  I am your Brother, I have been made like unto you in everything."

ROY HESSION 1908-87
From Shadow to Substance

March '18 Devotional ~"What must be the Glory of the Heavenly City?"

“The city had no need of the sun or of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God illuminated it. The Lamb is its light. And the nations of those who are saved shall walk in its light, and the kings of the earth bring their glory and honor into it. Its gates shall not be shut at all by day (there shall be no night there). And they shall bring the glory and the honor of the nations into it.”

Revelation 21:23-26

Take me to the crystal river that flows,

Where fruitful trees are given for our healing.

I want to dwell before the Lamb’s throne,

To see Your face, and stand, forever gazing.

Take me to the New Jerusalem,

Adorned with the beauty of a beloved bride.

Laden with glorious and precious gems,

Radiant with the brilliance of God most glorified.

    Take me to the water of life for the thirsty,

Where Your gentle hand wipes away tears of sorrow;

Where our sun will never set for all eternity,

Dwelling in Paradise with Your perfect Face to behold.

Take me to the clear, Golden City,

Where the forgiven rest in peaceful mansions,

Where darkness becomes a far, distant memory,

And the radiance of the Lamb fills the heavens.

Take me to Yourself upon eagle’s wings,

To the place where Your great glory shines;

Where Your redeemed fill the throne with thanksgiving,

Our sun, our moon, our Morning Star, shining bright.

Take Me

C.A. TAYLOR

Who has not marked even here the glory of God as seen in a great sunset. Rivers of glory wind through meadows of gold. Lakes of glory lie embedded in the evening sky. Seas of glory lap eternal shores with their shimmering waves. Mountains of glory rear themselves to the heavens with cloud-capped summits tipped with the splendor of the dying day. Earth too is flooded with the glory. It falls in the dim aisles of great forests and illumines them with its splendor. It dances among the wind-tossed leaves. It splotches the trunks of giant trees. It bathes in light the upturned faces of those who watch and worship as the climaxing splendor of earth, sea, and sky turns the heart to God our Father who is Himself the glory of all creation and who deigns to give us, in the lavish, golden glory of the sunset the faint forth-shadowing of the glory of the Father's House.

But if the earthly glory is such, what must be the glory of the heavenly city? It needs no sun, for the glory of God doth lighten it. The nations of the earth walk in the glory of it. Its foundations can only be likened to the glory of the diamond, the sapphire, the amethyst, the topaz, and like precious stones of earthly glory. Its gates are pearls —each wondrous gate a single pearl. The city and its street are gold. But it is gold which the earth knows not. For it is called "gold like unto clear glass" (Rev. 21:18), and "transparent glass" (Rev. 21:21). That is —it is the glory-gold. It is gold through which the glory of God can shine forth in crystal splendor. God uses this earthly imagery as the nearest symbolism by which He can give us any glint of the glory of His House prepared for us. But when all has been said it is as nought to that glory of which He says —

“Behold, the dwelling of God is with men. He will dwell with them, and they shall be His people….” (Rev. 21:3)

JAMES McCONKEY

This Devotional is dedicated to the joyful homecoming of Billy Graham to his forever home.