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Friday, October 26, 2018

Autumn Devo '18 "God’s interest in man is the interest not merely of grace but of creatorship."


Therefore, let those also who suffer according to the will of God entrust their souls to a faithful Creator in doing what is right.
1 Peter 4:19


O Lord, have mercy upon me
A wandering sinner in great need.
I need You to heal and restore—
Forgive my erring divided heart.
Cleanse my soul that’s torn apart,
My eyes return to You, gracious Lord.

I entrust my soul to You, my faithful Creator,
My loving and merciful Father and rightful King.
You’re the eternal One who will reign forever and ever.
Unto You, the Majestic Glory, my soul will sing.

Your love comes softly like the touch of angel’s wings;
Full forgiveness covers like snow, gently falling.
My soul is made clean and set free from this darkness—
I can now walk upon Your pathway of light.
My Rock, my Refuge and love of my life,
Your promised presence dispels all my loneliness.

I Entrust My Soul to You
C.A. TAYLOR


         God is a faithful Creator. That is an illumined and illuminating word. God’s interest in every man is the interest not merely of grace but of creatorship.
Man is created to become holy and blessed in the free service of God. Man falls into sin through the abuse of his freedom. Is God, then, to abandon His original purpose? The artist or architect has conceived his ideal labors for its realization in spite of obstacles. And will God abandon His design? No: the ‘faithful Creator’ ‘forsakes not the work of His own hands.’ He remains true to His original purpose. Humanity, in His idea, is a holy and blessed thing; and this idea must yet be realized. Trust in a faithful Creator is the keynote of the gospel, the explanation of the tranquility of Christ. There is much gold in human nature, but it is embedded in much quartz. Will God separate the gold from the quartz? The answer in the text seems to have been written for us and for all men. What is our real worth to Him in whom we live and move and have our being?
What do we mean when we speak of God as a faithful Creator? We mean that He is true to Himself; that He always acts from a definite purpose of good, to which He adheres.

This is so in the physical world. Is not science always reminding us that the whole universe is under the reign of law, that the revolution of a planet in its orbit and the growth of a wayside flower are alike the product of forces that have nothing arbitrary in them? The moon has her appointed seasons: the sun knoweth his going down. The ancient promise still stands: while the earth remaineth, seed-time and harvest, summer and winter will not cease. Now this uniformity of Nature is but another name for the faithfulness of God. He has placed man on the earth, He has taught him to cultivate the ground; and when human hands plough the fields and sow the seed, human hands reap the harvest ripened by sunshine and rain. In this way God keeps faith with man; having created him with needs, He gives him the means of supplying them. The physical world is adjusted to his senses; there is food for his hunger, water for his thirst; he eye loves beauty, and he finds it in the loveliness of green fields or waving corn or pastoral hills; his ear craves music, and he hears it in the ripple of the brooks and the song of the birds, and the rustle of the wind among the trees. It has been so from the first, and has continued so from generation to generation, because God is faithful to the creatures He has made.
JAMES HASTING
1 Peter


Summer and winter and springtime and harvest,
Sun, moon and stars in their courses above
Join with all nature in manifold witness
To Thy great faithfulness, mercy and love.

Thomas Chisholm