Sons and Daughters 12/31 Wednesday Wisdom

"Beloved now are we the Sons of God."  The same mighty Spirit that wrought in Christ, is in you. You are a son now, a daughter.Romans 8:14-16 is absolutely true and real in your life.
You are the sons and daughters of God by an actual birth of which Jesus spoke in John 3:3-8.  "Marvel not that I say unto thee, ye must be born from above."
You have been born of the same Spirit that conceived Jesus.
You are empowered with the same Spirit that wrought in Christ and finally raised Him from the dead.

-- E. W. Kenyon

Enlarge Our Hearts 12/30 Tuesday Truth

"Of His fullness we have all received."  The very gates of heaven are open.  He is pouring out such a blessing that our hearts cannot receive it, so He has to enlarge our hearts just as the man mentioned in Luke enlarged his barns so he would have a place to store his grains.
God has to enlarge our hearts so that we can receive of His fullness and not burst.

-- E.W. Kenyon

Exceeding Abundantly 12/29 Monday Meditation

"Now unto Him that is able to do exceeding abundantly above all that we ask or think according to the power that worketh in us."  You talk about being weak, about being powerless in the face of such a scripture! Put that modern testimony of uselessness over against this revelation of His fullness.
-- E.W. Kenyon

Let Jesus Be Big in You 12/19 Friday Faith

This will be my last post until  the Monday after Christmas, as we will have family here for a week.  Wishing everyone a blessed and wonder-filled Christmas.
Let Jesus Christ be big in you.
Count on Him rather than weakness.
Count on Him rather than circumstances.
Count on Him rather than the arm of flesh.
Rest in Him.
Take your place in Him.
Give Him his place in your life.
Do it now, and say to your heart, "I am more than conqueror: I am more than a victor; I am identified with the very Son of God; He is identified with me.  Now live and let Him live in you.

-- E.W. Kenyon

If you have Jesus... 12/18 Thursday Thoughts

We have in our bodies the great mighty Holy Spirit.He makes our bodies His temples.
We have all the power there is.
We have it now.
Have you Jesus?
You say, "Yes."
Well, if you have Jesus, you have everything.
Use your rights.
Use your privileges.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

Think of Faith 12/16 Wednesday Wisdom

Hanukkah (the feast of dedication, the festival of light) begins Tuesday at sundown... the celebration of our deliverance from our enemies.  Jesus celebrated Hanukkah:   John 10:22-23  "And it was at Jerusalem the feast of the dedication, and it was winter. And Jesus walked in the temple in Solomon's porch."

We are to think in terms of faith, to use the language of faith, to walk in the realm of faith, and to refuse any other walk.
We are the sons of God and are to walk as the first Son did when He walked on earth.
We bear about in our bodies the resurrection power of Jesus; the life of Jesus.

-- E.W. Kenyon

Doubts Are of the Devil 12/16 Tuesday Truth

How it dishonors Him for us to talk of doubts and to pray for faith in Him.We have no more business to deal in doubts than we have to deal in contraband goods.
We have no more right to deal in doubts than we have in narcotics.
Doubts are of the devil, and to honor doubts is to honor Satan; to honor unbelief is to dishonor God.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

If prayer is not answered... 12/15 Monday Meditation

If prayer is not answered, hold fast to your confession.
If the Name of Jesus does not give instant deliverance, hold fast your confession.
If the money does not come, stand by your confession.
Luke 1:37:  "No Word from God is void of power."
Isaiah 55:11: The Word must accomplish the will of the Father.
"So shall my word be that goeth forth out of my mouth:  it shall not return unto me void, but it shall accomplish that which I please, and it shall prosper in the thing whereto I sent it."

-- E.W. Kenyon 

What He Says I Am... 12/12 Friday Faith

What He says I am, I declare that I am.
I make my confession boldly.
You make your confession:  "God is my Father; I am His child.  As a son in His family, I am taking my place.  I am acting my part.  I am in Christ.  Christ is in me."
You remember that the Father will be to you what you confess Him to be.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

Going Back on Your Prayer 12/11 Thursday Thoughts

A woman said recently after I had prayed for her and opened the Word to her, "You will keep on praying for my disease, won't you?"
Her confession was the Word was a lie...

There is a danger of praying, then going back on your prayer.
When you pray for some need, and declare that the need is not met, you have repudiated your prayer.
But prayer is answered.
His Word is real.
Do not annul the Word by a negative confession.

E.W. Kenyon 

Dangers of Wrong Confession 12/10 Wednesday Wisdom

"Confession" is this case does not mean, as we usually think of it, confession of sin.  It means stating (confessing) that things are the way they are instead of stating the way that they can be.

There is a grave danger of making a wrong confession, a wrong affirmation.
We confess our fears and doubts.  That gives Satan dominion.
We confess our sickness and that confession binds our will as a captive and holds us in absolute slavery.
We confess our want and lack of money, and want comes like an armed man and holds us in bondage.
We confess lack of ability, in the face of the fact that God said He was the strength of our life.
These confessions of failure shut the Father out, and let Satan in; give him the right-of-way.
These confessions repudiate the Word of God.  They honor Satan.
What should we confess?
Psalm 23:1:  "The Lord is my shepherd; I do not want."
You are not afraid anymore, and you confess it.
John 10:29:  "My Father is greater than all."
Our words imprison us, or they set us free.  

-- E.W. Kenyon 

With Joy 12/9 Tuesday Truth

With joy we confess Psalm 23:1, "The Lord is my shepherd; I shall not want."Jeremiah 16:19: "O Jehovah, my strength, and my stronghold, and my refuge in the day of affliction."
Phil. 4:13:  "I can do all things in Christ who strengtheneth me."
I say to the world:  "The Lord Jesus is my supply.  He is my shepherd; I do not want."

-- E.W. Kenyon

Use the Name 12/8 Monday Meditation

Few of us have realized the power of His Word on our lips.He said in Mark 16:18 that  those who believe "shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover."
John 14:13:  "Whatsoever ye shall ask in my Name, that will I do."
Acts 3 deals with the story of the Name in Peter's lips.  He said, 'look on us ... In the name of Jesus Christ of Nazareth, walk."
If you do not use the Name, the Name can do nothing.
But if you will use the Name, it will be as the Father's Name was in Jesus' lips.

-- E.W. Kenyon

You Stand Complete 12/5 Friday Faith

"If therefore the Son shall make you free, ye shall be free indeed."
The truth will make you free.  You declare that whom the Son has made free is free in reality, that sin cannot lord it over you any longer, that disease and sickness cannot lord it over you.
Romans 6:14:  "For sin shall not have dominion over you," or "lord it over you."
Worry and anxiety cannot lord it over you.  Satan's dominion is ended.
You stand complete in Him.

-- E.W.Kenyon 

Positive and Negative Confession 12/4 Thursday Thoughts

Confession heals, or confession keeps you sick.By your confession, you are saved or lost.
By your confession, you have plenty, or you lack.
By your confession, you are weak, or you are strong.
You are what you confess with your lips, and what you believe in your heart.
Your confession of failure keeps you in the realm of failure.
Proverbs 6:2:  "Thou art snared with the words of thy mouth..."
We are snared by our confession, or we are set free with the words of our confession.
Make your confession harmonize with the Word of God.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

Our Words Determine Our Faith 12/3 Wednesday Wisdom

Our confession must be a confession of the absolute faithfulness of the Word, of His finished work, and of the reality of our relationship as sons and daughters.
Our words determine our faith.
Our words are our confession.
If I continually confess lack; I believe in lack; my confession surely becomes a reality.
I confess the things which I believe.
If I believe in failure and weakness, I will confess it.
I will live up to the standard of my confession.
If I dare say that Psalm 34:10 is true, "But they that seek Jehovah shall not want any good thing," and if I stand by my confession, God will make good all I have confessed.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

One With Him 12/2 Tuesday Truth

We are actually one with Him.We actually belong to royalty.
We are as much a part of Jesus as He and the Father are a part of each other.
His very substance and being is in us.
I wonder what would happen to us if we meditated about our oneness with Christ, our union with the Body of Christ.

-- E.W. Kenyon

Delivered and Translated 12/1 Monday Meditation

Col. 1:13-14:  "Who delivered us out of the authority of darkness, and translated us into the kingdom of the Son of His love; in whom we have our redemption, the remission of our sins."
You have been delivered out of Satan's authority.
You have been translated into the kingdom of the Son of His love.
You are in the place of His protection and care.
You are in the place where you feed upon the bread of the Mighty.
The manna of heaven is in this living Word.
As you feed upon it, you will grow up spiritually into the image and the stature of the Son of God.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

Power Is Ability 11/26 Wednesday Wisdom

This will be the last post until Monday.  Hope you all have a happy and blessed Thanksgiving and a wonderful time with family and friends.

Jesus said in Acts 1:8:  "Ye shall receive power, when the Holy Spirit is come upon you."
That word "power" is "ability."  You have ability to witness, ability to know and do the will of the Father, and ability to know how to use the Name of Jesus and how to enter into all the fullness of our inheritance in Christ.
The Holy Spirit is your ability.

-- E.W. Kenyon

In the Face of Everything 11/25 Tuesday Truth

In the face of everything, you hold fast to that fact that He said you are healed, and, if He said you are healed, you are.You dare say aloud, "I am what He says I am.  I can do what He says I can do.  He says I can come boldly to the Throne of Grace and have my prayers answered.  He says that I have authority over all the power of the enemy, and that I am a master of demons and a master of sickness in the name of Jesus Christ, His Son, and I know He can't lie.  I know that what He says is true.  I boldly take my stand, and in the face of everything that may come, I hold fast to my confession.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

How the Father Looks Upon You 11/24 Monday Meditation

This is how the Father looks upon you.
Your sins and diseases have been put away.
You have become the righteousness of God in Christ.
You have become perfectly healed in His Substitutionary Work.
When you find this out, in the face of the fact that the cancer is still there, you begin to praise the Father for your perfect healing, your sense-ruled friends cannot understand you.  They think you are beside yourself.
You are not, but by faith you are now taking your stand you are confessing what you really are in Christ, and in the face of pain you hold fast to your confession.

-- E. W. Kenyon 

"I Hope..." Is Only a Delusion 11/21 Friday Faith

I say, I hope I will get my healing.
I am sure that I will have it some time.There is no value in that confession.
It is only a delusion.
It is not faith.
This is merely sense knowledge hope, but now I know the Word, and if I pray, I get it.
I know Jesus bore this disease.
I know that Isaiah 53:4-6 is an absolute fact.  "Surely he hath borne our sicknesses and carried our pains, and we have come to esteem him as the one who was stricken, smitten of God and afflicted (with our diseases).   He was wounded for our transgressions, He was bruised for our iniquities; the chastisement of our peace was upon Him; and with his stripes we are healed."

-- E. W. Kenyon 

God-Inside-Minded 11/20 Thursday Thoughts

You have arrived, and on the ground of that, you begin to take your place as a son, as a daughter in the family of God.
You have back of you His living Word, and back of the Word is His Throne, and back of the Throne is God Himself.
You are quite safe.
When you know this as you know addition and subtraction, you will have a fearless confession.
You will dare to tell the world what you are, and what you can do.
You will be able to say with perfect fearlessness:  "When I pray, the Father hears me."
You are not afraid to say: "Greater is He that is in me than any circumstance that may confront me, any difficulty that may confront me.  I become the master of circumstances in Christ.  I have come to recognize the reality of His indwelling and have become God-inside-minded.
-- E.W. Kenyon 

Spiritual Death 11/19 Wednesday Wisdom

For years I wondered what Spiritual Death was.I knew that Spiritual Life was the Nature of the Father.
I knew that Spiritual Death must be the Nature of Satan.
Then I saw that the Nature of the Father is revealed through our conduct, our acts of love.
Like a flash I saw it, Satan's Nature is selfishness.
God so loved that He gave.
Satan was so selfish that he sought to rob God and the human race of everything worth while.
Selfishness is a robber.
It had reigned without a rival through the ages.
Now a mighty new Force has broken into the Sense Realm.
That mighty Force is Love.
It heads up in God.
It was unveiled in Christ.
It is becoming operative in us.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

Selfishness and Love 11/18 Tuesday Truth

You see there are two major forces in the world; selfishness, and love.Selfishness has given birth to all our sorrow, heartaches and tears.  It has caused all the wars and other atrocities in which men take part.
The world is not yet acquainted with the new kind of love, Agapa love.
Few have seen it in practice, and still fewer enjoy its fullness.
It absolutely eliminates selfishness.

-- E. W. Kenyon 

Seated With Him 11/17 Monday Meditation

We have found the thing that the human heart has craved through all the ages.
When Jesus sat down, His work was finished, and He made me to sit down with Him.
You see, he raised me up with Him.  He seated me with Him.
I am one with Him.
He is the Head. I am part of the Body.
He is the Vine.  I am a branch.
My life is hidden with Christ in God, my Saviour, my Lord.
My gracious, wonderful Saviour, High Priest, will come back by and by to receive me unto Himself.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

Psalm 23 (part 7) 11/14 Friday Faith

And now, "goodness and mercy," the twins of grace, walk arm in arm with me along life's wonderful pathway.I am dwelling in the presence of my Lord forever.  Hallelujah!
This is just a little picture of the New Creation realities.

-- E.W. Kenyon

Psalm 23 (part 6) 11/13 Thursday Thoughts

"Thou anointest my head with oil."  I have discovered that I am in the priesthood.  I belong to the Royal family.  For only they are anointed.
"My cup runneth over."  I have joys unspeakable.  This is a wonderful life I am living with my Lord.

-- E.W. Kenyon

Psalm 23 (part 5) 11/12 Wednesday Wisdom

But hear this.  "Thou preparest a table before me in the presence of my enemies."
No one can eat in the presence of enemies, for appetite is gone.
But these are conquered enemies.  They are bound enemies.
Where I have been defeated, conquered, and overcome, perhaps disgraced, I reign as a king in the realm of life through Jesus Christ my Lord.
 

-- E.W. Kenyon

Psalm 23 (part 4) 11/11 Tuesday Truth

"Thy rod" of protection and "thy staff" of plenty; "they comfort me."  I am shielded, I am cared for, I am hidden away in Him.  He is my protection.

-- E. W. Kenyon 

Psalm 23 (part 3) 11/10 Monday Meditation

And "He leadeth me in the paths" of this new kind of righteousness where I do not fear my enemies.The "paths of righteousness" are the paths of the New Creation.
And though I walk in the realm of spiritual death where everyone is ruled by the Adversary, "I shall fear no evil."
For I hear when He whispers "Lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the age." 

-- E.W. Kenyon

Psalm 23 (part 2) 11/7 Friday Faith

"He restoreth my soul."  That means if there is anything that has frightened me, caused me to worry, filled me with fear, He restores my soul.  He pulls me out of my fear and dread into rest and quietness.
(to be continued)

-- E. W. Kenyon

Psalm 23 ( part 1) 11/6 Thursday Thoughts

The twenty-third Psalm is a perfect picture of the earth walk of the believer."The Lord is my shepherd," my bread-provider.  How can I want?  He causes me to "lie down in green pastures."  I live in divine affluence.  He knows every need of my life, and so I lie down, under His protection, in green pastures of plenty.
Sweet water flows by me, clear and sparkling as a crystal. I am the Jesus-cared-for one.
(to be continued)

-- E. W. Kenyon

The Bread Provider 11/5 Wednesday Wisdom

Now Jesus becomes the surety of the New Covenant.Not only is He that, but He is our Lord High Priest.
He is the Bread Provider.
He is like a husband to a wife.  Truly He is our Bride-groom and as the Lord Bride-groom, He provides our needs.
He watches over us, shields us from the enemy, is our protector.
The twenty-third Psalm is a perfect picture of the earth walk of the believer.

(to be continued:  an inspiring meditation on Psalm 23 over the next several days) 

-- E. W. Kenyon

Absolute Master 11/4 Tuesday Truth

Remember Matthew 28:18-19:  "All authority hath been given unto me in heaven and on earth.  Go ye therefore, and make students of the whole world."  (Disciple means student.)
And these students have the authority that Jesus manifested in hell, today in that mighty Name.
If you could only realize this fact, that you actually have a legal right to the authority and power invested in Jesus' Name and you can use it.
You have the power of attorney to use Jesus' Name.
You are an absolute master of Satanic forces.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

Power to Use His Name 11/3 Monday Meditation

And when He met John, He said, "I am he that was dead and behold, I am alive forever more, and I have the keys of death and of Hades."
He had conquered Satan.
He had stripped him of his authority.
Keys represent authority.
Jesus was the master of all hell.
He did not conquer Satan for Himself.
Jesus conquered Satan for us, for you and for me.
It was as though you personally had met Satan and conquered him and stripped him of his authority and stood a master over him.
Now you can understand why Jesus gave us power of attorney to use His Name.
He said, "In my name ye shall cast out demons. Ye shall lay hands on the sick and they shall recover. 

-- E.W. Kenyon

The Vital Need 10/31 Friday Faith

Can't you see the vital need of our studying to find out what we really are in Christ?  What the Spirit, through the Word, has really wrought in us that has made us acceptable to Him until He can whisper, "You are in the Beloved."
That means you are as near the Father's heart as Jesus is.
Jesus' great prayer in John 17 almost clamors in this request, "Father, that they may know that thou lovest them, even as thou lovest me."

-- E. W. Kenyon

Partakers of His Own Nature 10/30 Thursday Thoughts

We are become partakers of His own nature.  Not only that, but He has deigned to come and make His home in our bodies.I cannot grasp this with sense knowledge.
I simply know that it is a fact, and my spirit bears witness with the Word that it is true.
He is in me now.  That great, mighty Spirit who raised Jesus from the dead is in me as I dictate this.

-- E.W. Kenyon 

What We Really Are 10/29 Wednesday Wisdom

We stand there as sons in the presence of the Father of love.We have been recreated out of His own heart.
We are of His own substance.
You know it will be a great day when large bodies of believers come to understand what they really are in Christ.
"Wherefore if any man is in Christ, he is a new creation."
He is a new species; something the world had never known until the Day of Pentecost.
He is so nearly like Christ, so utterly one with Him, that Christ can say, "I am the vine, and ye are the branches."

-- E. W. Kenyon 

The Agonies of Deity 10/28 Tuesday Truth

"God so loved."
Our language is inadequate to express this love of One who became sin for us.
Deity is paying the penalty for having loved humanity much, and for craving a family.
He is suffering because He created humanity; because He brought man into being.
"Him who knew no sin has become sin."
"He is putting sin away by the sacrifice of himself."
The agonies of Deity in redeeming the human race can never be known by finite mind.

-- E. W. Kenyon 

E. W. Kenyon 10/27 Monday Meditation

Time to start going through another book by another author.  After setting aside some other books and authors where the Lord wasn't leading me, I'm going to start a series of quotes from What Happened from the Cross to the Throne by E. W. Kenyon.  For you Alliance readers, Kenyon  (1867-1948) was a close friend of A.B. Simpson, and they often exchanged pulpits.  E.W. Kenyon originated "positive confession" theology, and he is recognized as the forefather of the Word of Faith movement as it was originally taught.  I quoted from this book around 2007, if you've been in this group for a long time.

 

In Hebrews 4:16, He has invited us to come with boldness unto the Throne of Grace.

That is the new Holy of Holies, the new Throne-room where we, as sons and daughters, have a standing invitation to come.

We not only come when our hearts are burdened with grief and need, but we come when our hearts are filled with joy and laughter.

We come when our hearts are filled with gratitude and love and praise.

Our Father is holding a reception all the time for us.

We go in there and make our requests known.  We open our hearts to Him with fullest confidence.

We have Jesus' assurance, "Whatsoever ye shall ask of the Father in my name, He will give it to you."

We are His love children.

Brother Lawrence 10/24 Friday Faith

Brother Lawrence was a 17th Century French monk who is best known for his devotional book, The Practice of the Presence of God.

 

 In order to know God, we must often think of Him; and when we come to love Him, we shall then also think of Him often, for our heart will be with our treasure.

I drove away from my mind everything capable of spoiling the sense of the presence of God…. I just make it my business to persevere in His holy presence… My soul has had an habitual, silent, secret conversation with God.

There is not in the world a kind of life more sweet and delightful, than that of a continual conversation with God; those only can comprehend it who practice and experience it.

John Wesley 10/23 Thursday Thoughts

John Wesley, an 18th Century Church of England clergyman, led a great revival among the common people of England.  This was the beginning of The Methodist Church. 

 

You have nothing to do but to save souls. Therefore spend and be spent in this work. And go not only to those that need you, but to those that need you most. It is not your business to preach so many times, and to take care of this or that society; but to save as many souls as you can; to bring as many sinners as you possibly can to repentance.

Give me one hundred preachers who fear nothing but sin and desire nothing but God, and I care not whether they be clergymen or laymen, they alone will shake the gates of Hell and set up the kingdom of Heaven upon Earth.

George Mueller (pt. 3) 10/22 Wednesday Wisdom

To learn strong faith is to endure great trials. I have learned my faith by standing firm amid severe testings.

Faith does not operate in the realm of the possible. There is no glory for God in that which is humanly possible. Faith begins where man’s power ends
.
Faith is the assurance that the thing which God has said in His word is true, and that God will act according to what He has said in his word… Faith is not a matter of impressions, nor of probabilities, nor of appearances.

-- George Mueller

George Mueller (pt. 2) 10/21 Tuesday Truth

The vigor of our spiritual life will be in exact proportion to the place held by the Bible in our life and thoughts.

The less we read the Word of God, the less we desire to read it, and the less we pray, the less we desire to pray.

I saw that the most important thing I had to do was to give myself to the reading of the word of God, and to meditation on it. . . . What is the food of the inner man? Not prayer, but the word of God; and . . . not the simple reading of the word of God, so that it only passes through our minds, just as water runs through a pipe, but considering what we read, pondering over it, and applying it to our hearts.

George Mueller 10/20 Monday Meditation

George Mueller was an extraordinary Christian in 19th Century England.  He founded a system of orphanages which cared for 10,000 orphans in his lifetime, and he started 117 schools.  He operated entirely on faith, never asking for money or making his needs known, and God responded with miraculous provision.    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_M%C3%BCller

 

God judges what we give by what we keep.

The Christian should never worry about tomorrow or give sparingly because of a possible future need. Only the present moment is ours to serve the Lord, and tomorrow may never come.

A brother with small earnings may ask,”Should I also give? My earning are already so small that my family can barely make ends meet.” My reply is, ”Have you ever considered that the very reason your earnings remain so small may be because you spend everything on yourself? If God gave you more, you would only use it to increase your own comfort instead of looking to see who is sick or who has no work at all that you might help them."

Corrie Ten Boom (pt. 3) 10/17 Friday Faith

Don’t pray when you feel like it. Have an appointment with the Lord and keep it. A man is powerful on his knees.

When a Christian shuns fellowship with other Christians, the devil smiles. When he stops studying the Bible, the devil laughs. When he stops praying, the devil shouts for joy.

Be united with other Christians. A wall with loose bricks is not good. The bricks must be cemented together.

Corrie Ten Boom (pt. 2) 10/16 Thursday Thoughts

Just prior to posting this, the counter on my blog hit 13,000 pages read since I started posting online.


“Dear Jesus…how foolish of me to have called for human help when You are here.”

If you look at the world, you’ll be distressed. If you look within, you’ll be depressed. If you look at God you’ll be at rest.

Hold everything in your hands lightly, otherwise it hurts when God pries your fingers open.

Corrie Ten Boom 10/15 Wednesday Wisdom

Corrie Ten Boom was part of a Dutch Christian family who hid Jews in their home during World War II.  Her family was captured.  She survived the concentration camps where her other family members died.  She is the author of The Hiding Place, which was made into a movie.  I heard her speak when she was in her 90s.

 Never be afraid to trust an unknown future to a known God.

There is no pit so deep, that God’s love is not deeper still.

Trying to do the Lord’s work in your own strength is the most confusing, exhausting, and tedious of all work. But when you are filled with the Holy Spirit, then the ministry of Jesus just flows out of you.

Charles G. Finney (part 2) 10/14 Tuesday Truth

Continuing with Charles G. Finney.   The presence of God was so strong in his revivals that people coming near a town where there was a revival would fall under conviction and get off their horses and repent.  People would fall under the power of the Spirit in their seats.  He would have to stop preaching until people had regained consciousness.

 

 

A state of mind that sees God in everything is evidence of growth in grace and a thankful heart.

Sin is the most expensive thing in the universe.

A tender heart always brings great peace to the soul.

The Gospel does not save whom it does not sanctify.

Charles G. Finney 10/13 Monday Meditation

Charles G. Finney led the great revival in upstate New York (where my great-great grandfather and great-great-great grandparents were saved) and throughout America (called "The Second Great Awakening") in the 1820's.  He invented the altar call.  He became president of Oberlin College.  I have been part of a large prayer meeting in Oberlin, praying around his traveling pulpit  for a new revival in northern Ohio.
When there are dissensions, and jealousies, and evil speakings among professors of religion, then there is great need of a revival. These things show that Christians have got far from God, and it is time to think earnestly of a revival.

A revival is nothing else than a new beginning of obedience to God.

There can be no revival when Mr. Amen and Mr. Wet-Eyes are not found in the audience.

Feast of Tabernacles (part 2) 10/10 Friday Faith

 Was Jesus Born in a Sukkah?  from Messianic Manna on Facebook

Has anyone ever wondered why does a manger scene resemble a baby in a Sukkah?
The answer is in the opinion of Messianic Manna is a simple one. Yeshua was actually born in a Sukkah (Booth). Am I saying that the feast of Sukkot is the time  of Yeshua’s birth? Yes I am. The basic scenario is that Miriam was with child during Hanukah and gave birth during Sukkot. The Roman Church established a different time to celebrate His birth. The establishment of a different date to correspond with a Pagan date does not negate the actual date. Do I have anything to back up my reasoning. Ohh, but yes I do. The complete answer may be beyond the scope of this Facebook post. However in order to whet your appetite to study for yourself let me throw a few interesting tid bits at you.

1: Was you aware that the word “Stables” is in some cases interpreted from the Hebrew word Sukkot ?
יז. וְיַעֲקֹב נָסַע סֻכֹּתָה וַיִּבֶן לוֹ בָּיִת וּלְמִקְנֵהוּ עָשָׂה סֻכֹּת עַל-כֵּן קָרָא שֵׁם-הַמָּקוֹם סֻכּוֹת:
Gen. 33:17. And Jacob journeyed to Succoth, and built himself a house, and made booths for his cattle; therefore the name of the place is called Succoth.

2: Did you notice that mankind carries a common ancient memory of Yeshua being born in a Stable that is usually depicted as temporary?

3: Did you know that if the birth of Yeshua is placed in the context of Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles) the story would then also account for the angelic greetings of “Hosanna in the highest!”—a pilgrimage-festival salutation connected with the recitation of the Hallel at Pesach, Shavuot, and Sukkot.

4: Did you know that a medieval collection of anti-Christian Jewish folklore titled The Story about Shim’on Kefa (Simon Peter) (Aggadta DeShim’on Kefa, אגדתא דשמען כיפא) preserves Jewish traditions about the early Jewish believers and early Christians.?
Notice here what it says:
“And in the place of the festival of Sukkot, you will celebrate the day of his birth, and on the eighth day from his birth, you will celebrate his circumcision.” (Aggadta DeShim’on Kefa)
This is how the sect of the Nazarenes was seen from the perspective of mainstream Judaism. Can anyone see the importance of this?

5: Did you know that we can show through Theological reasoning that YoHanon the Immerser (John the Baptist) was born during Passover and that Yeshua was born 6 months later placing Yeshua's birth in the Feast of Sukkot (Tabernacles) ? This may also be shown by understanding the time when Zechariah’s ministration of the priesthood was in serving the Temple.

6: Did you know that Sukkot is also called the Feast of Tabernacles, and that the Brit Hadashah (New Testament) declares : “The Word became flesh and tabernacled among us” (John 1:14).

  4-minute video on Sukkot (Feast of Tabernacles) on YouTube:  http://youtu.be/1RWfTmmoCA8

Feast of Tabernacles 10/9 Thursday Thoughts

The Feast of Tabernacles ("Sukkot") begins at sundown Wednesday, October 8, and continues through Thursday, October 16.  This is the third and final fall festival.  The fall festivals have moved through repentance and reconciliation to the joy of our redemption.  It is the most joyous and the most loved of all festivals.   Families live in elaborate booths that they have decorated for the holiday as a reminder of how God cared for them in the wilderness.  There is good biblical evidence that Jesus was born during the Feast of Tabernacles, probably in a sukkah booth. (More tomorrow).

During the water ceremony on the last day of the festival in Jerusalem, Jesus said, "If any man is thirsty, let him come to me and drink... From his innermost being shall flow rivers of living water."  (John 7:37-39). 

Jesus is God tabernacling among men.  Jesus is God's ultimate sukkah booth.  For God, in Jesus Christ, tabernacles among men.  As the Temple was a temporary dwelling for the Shekinah, so Jesus tabernacling among us manifested the glory of God.  (The Fall Feasts of Israel, by Mitch and Zhava Glaser)

I will be celebrating by attending a Feast of Tabernacles concert by leading Messianic recording artist Paul Wilbur at Tikvat Yisrael Messianic Congregation in Cleveland on Saturday.  This will be his fourth concert / worship experience that Joanne and I have attended.  Look him up on YouTube.

For more information on the Feast of Tabernacles, see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukkot

D. L. Moody 10/8 Wednesday Wisdom

Featuring some favorite quotes from D.L. Moody, famous evangelist, pastor (who had no education and was never ordained), and founder of Moody Bible Institute. 
Out of 100 men, one will read the Bible, the other 99 will read the Christian.

The Bible was not given for our information but for our transformation.

Give me a man who says this one thing I do, and not those fifty things I dabble in.
 
What makes the Dead Sea dead? Because it is all the time receiving, never giving out anything. Why is it that many Christians are cold? Because they are all the time receiving, never giving out anything.

Our greatest fear should not be of failure, but of succeeding at something that doesn’t really matter.

George Whitefield 10/7 Tuesday Truth

This week we are using some miscellaneous quotes by great Christians of the past.

George Whitefield (pronounced Whit-field) was the greatest 18th Century American revivalist / evangelist.  Here are three of his famous quotes. 
We are immortal till our work is done.

Take care of your life and the Lord will take care of your death.

 True conversion means turning not only from sin but also from depending on self-made righteousness. Those who trust in their own righteousness for conversion hide behind their own good works. This is the reason that self-righteous people are so angry with gospel preachers, because the gospel does not spare those who will not submit to the righteousness of Jesus Christ!

Our Turn 10/6 Monday Meditation

Last week we completed the quotes from the complete sermons of Smith Wigglesworth.  Before we start quoting from another "Pentecostal pioneer", I'm going to use some quotes that were suggested to me by a reader.

Those heroes are gone now; it is our turn. That is why I get excited when I hear stories of people just like you and me who are seeing the same things our heroes saw. These are everyday people walking through their own normal problems with tiny faith and producing huge outcomes.

 

Think about this: Many of us who think that the impossible is not within our grasp are the same people who believe that one day we will leave our bodies and shoot off into heaven. How can we be sure? We believe this by faith. Then why not use that same type of childlike faith to say, "God, we have no idea how this all works, but we want to see You do fun, weird, miraculous stuff through us." Jesus continues to show me that I will miss 100 percent of the shots that I never take...

 

 But I cannot help asking why so many of us live our lives without the victories that our biblical ancestors experienced. If we say that we are children of a Father who props up His feet on the moon, then might our lives resemble something close to supernatural?

 

-- Chad Norris, M. Div., quoted on the Charisma Magazine Facebook page 

YOM KIPPUR 10/3 Friday Faith

The holiest day on the Jewish calendar begins at sundown Friday.  Jesus Himself observed this day, the Day of Atonement, which points to the Atonement that He would bring.  It concludes the Ten Days of Awe, or self-examination, which began at Rosh Hashanah.  During this time we are to ask forgiveness for ways in which we have sinned against others.
On Yom Kippur, the high priest entered the Holy of Holies and saw the Shekinah (the manifest presence of the Lord) over the Mercy Seat.  The sins of the people were put onto a scapegoat, that was led to its death in the wilderness.  A bull was then offered for atonement. 

"For the Christian, Yom Kippur should be a day of great celebration, a day when we remember that Christ died for us... It should remind us that salvation is by grace, received by faith, and that even faith is a 'gift of God' (Eph. 2:8-9).  We need not worry that our bad deeds may outweigh the good in God's balance scales of judgment.  Our salvation rests securely upon God Himself.  What freedom and joy we experience, and how gracious He is to save us from sin!

"Believers who trust in the blood of Christ experience God's presence more than any high priest ever did.  The ancient high priest could enter God's presence on one day each year, and then only with fear and trembling.  Yet those of us who know Jesus can boldly enter His heavenly throne room and step into the glorious presence of God."  

--The Fall Feasts of Israel, by Mitch and Zhava Glaser

For additional information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yom_Kippur

THE FINAL WIGGLESWORTH QUOTE 10/2 Thursday Thoughts

This quote is the last paragraph of the complete works of Smith Wigglesworth.  Tomorrow I'll be featuring Yom Kippur, then next week we'll have some miscellaneous quotes that have been suggested to me before we start another author/teacher. 
I am a father and I want to give my boys the very best.  We human fathers are but finite, but our heavenly Father is infinite.  There is no limit to the power and blessing He has laid up for them that love Him.  Be filled with the Spirit.

So Much More 10/1 Wednesday Wisdom

Tomorrow I will be concluding my Wigglesworth quotes.  This is from the last paragraph of the last sermon in the complete book of Smith Wigglesworth's sermons.

There is more for us all yet, praise the Lord.  This is only the beginning.  So far we  have only touched the fringe of things.  there is so much more for us if we will but yield to God.

Do you want to receive the Spirit? 

If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children:  how much more shall your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to them that ask him?  --Luke 11:13 

MY 1000th FAITH QUOTES POST! 9/30 Tuesday Truth

Today marks the 1000th "Lep's Faith Quotes" post on www.lepsfaithquotes.com and "Lep's Faith Quotes" group on Facebook.  I began posting there on July 30, 2010.   The counters show that each quote is read an average of 38 times.  The quotes are read around the world, including by several pastors in the U.S., Africa, and India.  More pages were read in Russia last week than in the U.S. ! 

The quotes go into an additional 16 homes by email.  If you receive this by email, you've read OVER 2000 QUOTES if you've been in the email group since it started in 2006.  I hope that these quotes have blessed you and helped you to grow in your faith and the realization of your spiritual authority over the works of the enemy.

How we have sinned against God!  How we lack this spirit of compassion.  Do we weep as we look forth upon the unsaved?  If not we are not Pentecost-full.  Jesus was moved with compassion, are you?

-- Smith Wigglesworth  

A Baptism of Love 9/29 Monday Meditation

Is it possible after we have been baptized with the Holy Ghost to be satisfied with what we see?  What made Jesus weep over Jerusalem?  Because He had a heart of compassion -- sin-sick souls everywhere -- we want a baptism of love which goes to the bottom of the disease.  To cry unto God until He brings us up to the measure of the stature of the fulness of Christ.

-- Smith Wigglesworth 

Repentance 9/26 Friday Faith

Where is the fault for the state of things we see today?  The lack of a deep spirit of repentance.  Weeping is not repentance, sorrow is not repentance.  Repentance is a turning away and doing the work of righteousness and holiness.

--Smith Wigglesworth

ROSH HASHANAH: Happy New Year! 9/25 Thursday Thoughts

If you know me very well, you know that I like to educate Christians about their Jewish heritage, particularly the Old Testament festivals that Jesus Himself celebrated, which all were foreshadowings of His own birth, death, resurrection, and return.

Rosh Hashanah ("head of the year") or Yom Teruah ("Day of the Shout") or Feast of Trumpets begins at sundown Wednesday, September 24, and continues through Friday.

 

 Leviticus 23: ²³ Again the Lord spoke to Moses, saying, ²⁴ “Speak to the sons of Israel, saying, ‘In the seventh month on the first of the month you shall have a ^[d]rest, a reminder by blowing of trumpets, a holy convocation. 

 

The blowing of the shofar symbolized God's judgment, Israel's repentance, and divine restoration.  Jews in Jesus's time believed that the shofar would announce the resurrection of the dead.

Rosh Hashanah is traditionally the day that the world was created.  It begins a ten-day period of repentance, culminating on Yom Kippur. 

Why is the new year celebrated on the seventh month (Tishri) of the lunar calendar?  "B'resheet" ("in the beginning") is the first word in the Bible.  Spelled backwards, it reads "On the first of Tishri".   I'm sure you're all slapping your foreheads wondering why you didn't realize that!  LOL.  
 

For the fourth year, BP1 and I will be welcoming the new year at Sar Shalom Messianic Congregation in Mansfield.  Don U. and BP2 will be joining us this year for the first time.  We will have a celebration with liturgical dance, liturgical prayers, contemporary praise and worship with dancing the hora around the sanctuary, blowing about 30 shofars outdoors at sunset, and eating sweets for a sweet new year.    

from Sar Shalom's assistant rabbi Michelle Foss on Facebook:

Here's the Hebrew idiom of all Hebrew idioms...
 In Judaism, because no one knows the day or the hour of Rosh Hashanah- because it is the only feast that falls on the first day of the new moon/month on 1 Tishrei...
when the watchmen see the first white sliver of light on the blackened disc of the moon...it ushers in the feast of trumpets...
and because it looks like a winking eye, they call it the "twinkling of an eye!"
 In ancient Israel, the watchmen had posts from the desert to Jerusalem - when they saw that sliver of white light on the moon, they would light each of their torches from the various distances of their posts...
they would sound their shofars, so it sounded like thunder, and the torchlights resembled a flashing of lightning all the way from the west to the east!
 Now I don't know about you, but scripture does say we won't know the day or the hour, but we will be able to discern the signs and seasons - "the ot and the moedim..." it also says this...

 Mat 24:27 For as the lightning comes forth from the east and shines as far as the west, so also will be the coming of the Son of Man.  ...
 
1Co 15:51 Behold, I shew you a mystery; We shall not all sleep, but we shall all be changed,
1Co 15:52 In a moment, in the twinkling of an eye, at the last trump: for the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raised incorruptible, and we shall be changed.
 
1Th 4:16 Because the Master Himself shall come down from Heaven with a commanding shout of an archangel's voice, and with the trumpet of YAHWEH. And the dead in Messiah will rise again first.
1Th 4:17 Then we who remain alive will be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet with our Master in the air. And so we will always be with our Master.

  for more information:    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosh_Hashanah

Singing in the Dark 9/24 Wednesday Wisdom

When the pressure is heavy that is the time to sing.  Pressure is permitted to strengthen the attitude and spirit of praise.  It takes a man to sing in the dark when the storm and battle are raging, and it is such singing that makes the man.

-- Smith Wigglesworth 

Praise is God's Sunlight 9/23 Tuesday Truth

Praise is God's sunlight in the heart.  It destroys sin germs.  It ripens the fruits of the Spirit.  It is the oil of gladness that lubricates life's activities.  There can be no holy life without it.  It keeps the heart pure and they eye clear.  Praise is essential to the knowledge of God and His will.  The strength of a life is the strength of its song.

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Bread 9/22 Monday Meditation

Children of God have bread, it is the life of Jesus.  Jesus has all the bread you want, for spirit, soul, and body.

-- Smith Wigglesworth

God's Word Abideth 9/19 Friday Faith

God has established truth in His Word.  Men have tried to bring it to nought.  God has His Word in the earth, it is also settled in heaven.  If you are on the Word you are eternally fixed.  God has said it, it is established, the Word of God abideth forever.  Men pass away, things change, but God's Word abideth forever.

-- Smith Wigglesworth  

Anything that... 9/18 Thursday Thoughts

When Satan can get to your body he will, if possible, make the pain, or the weakness, so distracting that it will affect your mind, and always bring your mind down to where the pain is.  When that takes place, you haven't the same freedom in the Spirit to lift up your heart and shout, and praise the Lord, because the distraction of the pain brings the elementary power which ought to be full of praise to God, down into the body...

Beloved, I mean precisely this:  Anything that takes me from a position where I am in an attitude of worship, of peace, of joy, of a consciousness of the presence of God, of an inward moving of the powers of God that makes me able to lift myself up and live in the world as though I was not of it (because I am not of it); anything that dethrones me from that attitude is evil, is Satan.

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Sickness and Disease 9/17 Wednesday Wisdom

I have looked through my Bible, and I cannot find where God brings disease and sickness.  I know there is glory, and I know it is the power of God that brings the glory; but it isn't God at all, but the devil that brings sickness and disease.

 

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Weakness of Believrs 9/16 Tuesday Truth

I am going on now to show you the weakness of believers.  Does God know all about you?  Is He acquainted with you altogether?  Why not trust Him who knows all about you, instead of telling somebody else who knows only what you have told them.

Again, why should you -- under any circumstances -- believe that you will be better by being diseased?  When disease is impurity, why should you ever believe that you should be sanctified by having a great deal of sickness?  

Some people talk about God being pleased to put disease on His children.  "Here is a person I love," says God.  "I will break his arm.  In order that he should love Me more, I will break his leg.  In order that he should love Me still more, I will give him a weak heart.  And in order to increase that love, I will make him so that he cannot eat anything without having digestion."   (to be continued)

--Smith Wigglesworth 


 

No Purification in Disease 9/15 Monday Meditation

Could the kingdom of heaven bring weaknesses?  diseases?  Could it bring imperfection on the body?  Could it bring consumption?  Could it bring extreme burnings, cancers, tumors? ...

The kingdom of heaven is the life of Jesus, it is the power of the Highest.  The kingdom of heaven is pure, it is holy.  It has no disease, no imperfection.  It is as holy as God is.  And Satan with his evil power "cometh not, but for to steal, and to kill, and to destroy" that body.

Every ailment that any one has tonight is from satanic source.  It is foolish and ridiculous to think that sickness purifies you.  There is no purification in disease.   

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Sons of God With Power 9/12 Friday Faith

Therefore, beloved, if you will hear the truth of the Gospel, you will see that God has made provision for you to be strong, to be on fire, to be as though you were quickened from the dead, as those who have seen the King, as those who have a resurrection touch.  We know we are the sons of God with power as we believe His Word and stand in the truth of His Word.

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Hunger and Thirst 9/11 Thursday Thoughts

Only one thing is going to accomplish the purpose of God -- that is, to be filled with the Spirit we must yield and submit, until our bodies are saturated with God, that at any moment God's will can be revealed.  We want a great hunger and thirst for God.

-- Smith Wigglesworth

A Rest of Faith 9/10 Wednesday Wisdom

He will keep you in perfect peace as you stay your mind upon Him and trust in Him.  He will bring you to a rest of faith, to a place of blessed assurance that all that happens is working for your eternal good.

-- Smith Wigglesworth
 

Count on Him 9/9 Tuesday Truth

The resurrected Christ appeared to Peter and a few more of them early one morning on the shore of the lake.  He prepared a meal for the tired, tried disciples.  This is just like Him.  Count on His presence.  Count on His power.  Count on His provision.  He is always there just where you need him. 
-- Smith Wigglesworth

In a Needy Place 9/8 Monday Meditation

You say, "I am in a needy place."  It is in needy places that God delights to work.  For three days the people that were with Christ were without food, and He asked Philip, "From whence shall we buy bread that these may eat?"  That was a hard place for Philip, but not for Jesus, for He knew perfectly what He would do.  That hard place is where He delights to show forth His miraculous power.  And how fully was the need provided for.  Bread enough and to spare!
-- Smith Wigglesworth

The Prize Ahead 9/5 Friday Faith

If we went all the way with God, what would happen?  What should we see if we would only seek to bring honor to the name of our God? ... There is no standing still.  We must move on to a fuller power of the Spirit, never satisfied that we have apprehended all, but filled with the assurance that God will take us on to the goal we desire to reach, as we press on for the prize ahead.

-- Smith Wigglesworth

A Raising from the Dead 9/4 Thursday Thoughts

This is one of the most famous stories from Smith Wigglesworth's ministry.   According to various accounts, he raised between nine and fourteen people from the dead in the course of his ministry.

One morning about eleven o'clock I saw a woman who was suffering with a tumor.  She could not live through the day.  A little blind girl led me to the bedside.  Compassion broke me up and I wanted that woman to live for the child's sake. I said to the woman, "Do you want to live?"  She could not speak.  She just moved her finger.  I anointed her with oil and said, "In the name of Jesus."  There was a stillness of death that followed; and the pastor, looking at the woman, said to me, "She is gone."

When God pours in His compassion it has resurrection power in it.  I carried that woman across the room, put her against a wardrobe, and held her there.  I said, "In the name of Jesus, death, come out."  And soon her body began to tremble like a leaf.  "In Jesus' name, walk,"  I said.  She did and went back to bed.

I told this story in the assembly.  There was a doctor there and he said, "I'll prove that."  He went to the woman and she told him it was perfectly true.  She said, "I was in heaven, and I saw countless numbers all like Jesus.  The I heard a voice saying, "Walk, in the name of Jesus.'"

There is power in the name of Jesus.  Let us apprehend it, the power of His resurrection, the power of His compassion, the power of His love.  Love will break the hardest thing -- there is nothing it will not break.
 

Miracles in Ceylon 9/3 Wednesday Wisdom

Some years ago I was in Ceylon.  In one place the folk complained, "Four days is not much to give us." ... "We are not touching the people here at all." I said, "Can you have a meeting early in the morning, at eight o'clock?"  They said they would.  So I said, "Tell all the mothers who want their babies to be healed to come, and all the people over seventy to come, and after that we hope to give an address to the people to make them ready for the baptism in the Spirit."

It would have done you good to see the four hundred mothers coming at eight o'clock with their babies, and then to see the hundred and fifty old people, with their white hair, coming to be healed.  We need to have something more than smoke to touch the people; we need to be a burning fire for God.  His ministers must be flames of fire.

-- Smith Wigglesworth 

Burning and Shining Lights 9/2 Tuesday Truth

The need in the world today is that we should be burning and shining lights to reflect the glory of Christ.  We cannot do it with a cold indifferent experience, and we never shall.  His servants are to be flames of fire.  Christ came that we might have life, and life more abundantly.  And we are to give that life to others, to be ministers of the life and power and healing virtue of Jesus Christ wherever we go.
-- Smith Wigglesworth

Purpose of the Holy Ghost 8/29 Friday Faith

I realize that when the Holy Ghost comes, He comes to enable us to show forth Jesus Christ in all His glory, to make Him known as the One who heals today as in the days of old.  The baptism in the Spirit is to enable us to preach as they did at the beginning, through the power of the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven and with the manifestation of the gifts of the Spirit.  Oh, if we would only let the Lord work in us, melting us until a new order arises, moved with His compassion!

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Given Authority 8/28 Thursday Thoughts

I was traveling from Egypt to Italy.  God was wonderfully on that ship with me, and every hour I was conscious of His blessed presence.  A man on the ship suddenly collapsed and his wife was terribly alarmed, and everyone else seemed to be.  Some said that he was about to expire.  But I saw it was just a glorious opportunity for the power of God to be manifested...

So right there on board that ship, in the name of Jesus I rebuked the devil, and to the astonishment of the man's wife and the man himself, he was able to stand.  He said, "What is this?  It is going all over me.  I have never felt anything like this before."  From the top of his head to the soles of his feet the power of God shook him.  God has given us authority over all the power of the devil.  Oh, that we may live in the place were we realize this always!

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Just the Same 8/27 Wednesday Wisdom

On the day of Pentecost He sent the power, and the remainder of the Acts of the Apostles tells of the witnessing of these Spirit-filled disciples, the Lord working with them, and confirming the word with signs following.  The Lord Jesus is just the same today.  The anointing is just the same.  The Pentecostal experience is just the same, and we are to look for like results as set forth in Luke's record [in Acts] of what happened in the days of the early church.

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Hold On 8/26 Tuesday Truth

Sometimes we are tempted to think that He has left us.  Oh, no.  He has promised never to leave us, and He will not fail.  Jacob held on until the blessing came.  We can do the same.

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Exceeding Abundantly 8/25 Monday Meditation

But there is a place of holiness, a place of meekness, a place of faith, where you can call to God, "I will not let thee go, except thou bless me" (Genesis 32:26).  And in response He will bless you exceeding abundantly above all you ask or think. 
-- Smith Wigglesworth

A Disappointment to God? 8/22 Friday Faith

Can you hold on to God as did Jacob?  You certainly can if you are sincere, if you are dependent, if you are broken, if you are weak.  It is when you are weak that you are strong (2 Corinthians 12:10).  But if you are self-righteous, if you are proud, if you are highminded, if you are puffed up in your own imagination, you can receive nothing from Him.  If you become lukewarm instead of being at white heat, you can become a disappointment to God.  And He says, "...I will spue thee out of my mouth"  (Revelation 3:16).

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Hold Fast 8/21 Thursday Thoughts

In wrestling, the strength is in the neck, the breast, and the thigh, but the greatest strength is in the thigh.  The Lord touched Jacob's thigh.  With his human strength gone, surely defeat was certain.  What did Jacob do?  He hung on.  God means to have people who are broken.  The divine power can only come when there is an end of our own self-sufficiency.  But when we are broken, we just hold fast.  If we let go then we shall fall short. 

-- Smith Wigglesworth

Never Let Go 8/20 Wednesday Wisdom

You cannot meet the terrible things that await you in the world unless you secure the blessing of God.  You must never let go.  Whatever you are seeking -- a fresh revelation, light on the path, some particular thing -- never let go.  Victory is yours if you are earnest enough.  If you are in darkness, if you need a fresh revelation, if your mind needs relief, if there are problems you cannot solve, lay hold of God and declare, "...I will not let thee go, except thou bless me" (Genesis 32:26).

-- Smith Wigglesworth